Certain Dark Things
by eirajenson
Summary: Harriet Potter has always been odd. Between having a shadow that moves on its own and chatting with snakes in the garden, learning she's a witch really isn't the strangest thing that's happened to the bespectacled girl with a lightning scar on her neck. [Fem!Harry, Slytherin!Harry, AU Retelling]
1. the shadow of the serpent charmer

**A/N: Hello! Thanks for checking out** ** _Certain Dark Things_** **! This is an eight-part AU retelling in which Harry Potter is born a girl and later Sorted into Slytherin House. The story explores a world in which various pieces of Voldemort's soul have gained sentience and exert their own influence over Magical Britain.**

 **Pairings: Harriet / Snape in Part 8 (Harriet is 21 and no longer a student). Hermione / Draco. Sirius / Remus. Elara(OC) / Fleur. Parts 1-7 concentrate on plot-adventure, mystery, themes of sisterhood, House pride, coming of age-more than any romance.**

 **Tags include: AU, Canon Divergence, Fem!Harry, Slytherin!Harry, Slytherin!Hermione,** **OoC!Neville, OFC, No Character Bashing, Violence, Angst, Horror, Necromancy, Pure-blood Politics, Child Abuse, Powerful!Horcruxes, Magical Theory. Later parts contain some darker themes.**

 _ **\- Now in Part Two -**_

* * *

 **1\. THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE**

 _hell is empty and all the devils are here. - w. shakespeare_

* * *

 _ **prologue. deathly reverence**_

The girl had barely begun to live before her life ended in a flash of green.

Caught in the space between here and _there_ , she might have drifted until the end of time, when the world would shudder and smoke and snuff itself out with a final, seething hiss—if not for a peculiar twist of fate that brought the looming specter of Death to Godric's Hollow on a desperate October night in 1981.

You see, Death never needed to waver far from the side of the man who called himself _Lord Voldemort_. For all that the Dark Lord despaired and spat upon his inevitable end, he danced willingly enough with his invisible nemesis and delighted in sending soul after soul into Death's waiting hands. Death took what was given to him, he wouldn't turn away those who crossed the Veil, but with every life lost and every flicker of green light, Death came to loathe the spiteful monster just a little bit more. He watched the soul break piece by piece by piece. Voldemort didn't have sovereignty over the end; he had no right to feed Death like a corpulent cat nipping at his master's heels.

For his lack of reverence even in the face of utter terror, Death hated the man who was born Tom Riddle all the more.

It was on the night of Samhain, when the Veil drew taut between the two worlds and the looming specter could almost step out into the realm of the living, that Death followed Voldemort to Godric's Hollow. He took the soul of the father, watched him crumple upon the carpeted stairs as Tom stepped over the man's limp corpse. He took the soul of the mother, heard her beg for the life of a terrified, black-haired child clinging to the rails of a crib.

He heard the mother's soul whisper, " _Spare her."_

Then Voldemort raised his wand for the third time, his silhouette a gruesome sight in the watery glow of a nightlight, the sweeping motion of his arm practiced like a reaper hewing through the stalks of a summer harvest. Green light struck the crying infant and splayed across the crook of her neck in a sizzling mimicry of lightning—only for something to go _wrong_ , some resplendent hitch of gold ambiance that blinded even Death himself stealing through the small nursery. The wall exploded outward. Another piece of Tom Riddle went flying away from the rest of his wretched being.

Death watched Voldemort flee, the man's pale visage shaken, his soul hemorrhaging—but ignorant Tom felt no remorse for what he had done, only a sick remnant of fear from witnessing the curse sling itself back in his direction, and so his soul found no respite as the Dark Lord fled into the night. Death didn't follow. Instead, he remained and looked down upon the still form of the infant with red seeping from her neck, her green eyes frozen, her being tangled in the net between this realm and the next.

Shadowy fingers slipped across the child's brow. _Strange_ , Death mused as he plucked the girl's soul from the Veil. He _knew_ this soul; had come across it in another time, another place, another _world_ , and had called it _Master_. The bit of Tom that had splintered from the already ravaged whole had twisted itself about the girl, strangling her soul like a determined snake, but something of the mother remained in a vein of gold suppressing the parasitic fragment.

Try as he might, Death could not steal that piece of Tom's wretched soul. It clung with unrivaled ferocity to the girl's in an attempt to consume and subvert it—but the innocent soul did not give in. It persisted, burnished and brilliant despite the taint trying to tear it apart.

An idea occurred to him.

He returned the soul to the girl. A shuddering breath escaped fragile lungs, and then weeping split the air, the great, gasping sobs of a wounded child shattering the solemnity of Death settling upon the broken home. The girl had lost everything in but a handful of minutes.

Death sunk into the shadows spilled about the crib's base. _Perhaps not everything_.

* * *

 _ **i. the shadow of the serpent charmer**_

The Dursleys of Number Four, Privet Drive, liked to think they were as normal as normal could be.

Really, they turned normalcy into an art form; Mrs. Dursley fancied herself a model housewife, Mr. Dursley the consummate businessman, and their son a rosy-cheeked, boisterous lad. Petunia Dursley—tall, blond, thin and rather horsey in appearance—cleaned house, gossiped with their equally nosy neighbors, and always had supper on the table by five in the evening. Vernon Dursley was a heavyset man with a black mustache and little hair on the crown of his head. He worked as a director at Grunnings, a firm that produced drills, a career so thoroughly mundane even his office was painted a boring beige. Their son, Dudley, often returned from school with a note or two of reprimand from his teachers, but they put off his antics as examples of youthful enthusiasm.

Yes, the Dursleys were perfectly bland. By all expectations, a soul would be hard-pressed to ever find a family duller, more average, more _ordinary_ than the Dursleys of Privet Drive.

They did, however, have a secret—a secret who lived in the cupboard under the stairs, a secret the Dursleys hated to acknowledge, a secret they denied and ridiculed and _feared_ in equal measures.

Her name was Harriet Potter, and she was _not_ a normal girl.

 **xXxXx**

The sudden rapping of knuckles on the cupboard door jerked Harriet out of unsound dreams. Groggy, she rose from her nest of well-worn blankets—and whacked her head on the underside of a stair riser.

" _Bloody_ hell…."

"What was that?" demanded the shrill voice on the other side of the door.

"Nothing, Aunt Petunia," Harriet slurred in response as she fumbled in the dark, her thin fingers curling around the cool metal of her wire-framed glasses. Her dream stayed with her like a filmy shroud of mist. She tried to wipe it from her skin, but the malignant sense of oozing dread remained, and when Aunt Petunia slid back the latch on the cupboard door, Harriet remembered that something had been there in her dream, something scrabbling at the handle trying to get inside. She shivered.

The door came open, and Harriet's eyes watered in the harsh brunt of morning sunshine. Aunt Petunia crouched at the entrance, wearing an apron already spotted with flour, glowering at the scrawny girl sitting in a dizzy heap atop her cot.

"Get up and get breakfast ready," she snapped. "And you'd best not burn the bacon."

"Of course, Aunt Petunia," Harriet said, because there was nothing else really she _could_ say. Harriet watched as her aunt sniffed and rose, turning on the heels of her white shoes before pacing back toward the kitchen. Harriet swayed for a moment and weighed the repercussions of falling back into her pillow against Aunt Petunia's eventual wrath. The black shadows in the cupboard created by the narrowly focused sunshine curled and twisted in such a way that was not at all typical for shadows to behave. The tendrils solidified into a rather comical approximation of an arrow and jabbed toward the waiting hall.

Harriet snorted. "Yeah, alright, I'm up and going, Set."

In her own opinion, the strangest thing about Harriet Potter had to be her shadow—or, to be more precise, the creature who lived within it. He had been there for as long as she could remember, and she knew he was a _he_ because of the vaguely looming, masculine shape he took when he stopped hiding underfoot. One of her earliest memories was of him making shadow puppets on the ceiling of her cupboard just to make her laugh. She knew nothing about him, really, and had only ever gotten three words out of the entity in the all the years she'd been testing him: " _yes_ ," " _no_ ," and " _Set,_ " which she later came to understand was his name.

Harriet was not like the Dursleys. She was thin-boned, green-eyed, and messy-haired—an ugly crow chick kicked too soon from the nest, short and skinny and pale from living in the dark for the better part of ten years like Gollum in her favorite storybooks. Her thick glasses had been picked from a bin at a local charity shop, and her hand-me-down clothes were stained and carelessly hemmed by her Aunt within an inch of their life. Whereas the Dursleys were fleshy and loud and red in color, Harriet was dry, quiet as the wind through winter trees and just as lackluster in hue. Her mum had been Aunt Petunia's sister, but Harriet just couldn't imagine coming from a woman related to anything _Dursley_.

She also had a scar upon her neck she had supposedly received in the accident that had killed her mum and dad ten years ago. A curious thing, it stretched from her right collarbone up around her throat and down part of her chest in fractal patterns, like branches of lightning spiraling through her flesh. The white color of the scarring stood out stark against even Harriet's pale skin, and her aunt often sneered whenever she caught sight of the strange marking. She wondered if the scar reminded Aunt Petunia of her sister Lily.

Sighing, Harriet shuffled out into the hall, feeling grubby and disheveled from sleeping in the stuffy dark of the cupboard. She ran her fingers through her short hair in a vain attempt to flatten the wilder spots, but nothing Harriet ever did tamed the mop on her head. Several times she'd pleaded with her aunt to let her grow it out, but Aunt Petunia had no time from her "scruffiness," and so every other month or so the woman took a pair of kitchen shears and hacked off Harriet's hair until it was only vaguely longer than a boy's. Her classmates often mocked her and called her " _Hairy Harry_." Harriet hated that.

The smell of vanilla and cinnamon invaded Harriet's nose when she walked into the kitchen and she sniffed in appreciation, glancing toward the oven to see Aunt Petunia moving a baked cake from its pan onto a cooling rack. Bowls of mixed frosting and little tacky decorations littered the counter. Harriet stifled a groan when she remembered it was Dudley's eleventh birthday.

 _Should have stayed in bed_.

The boy himself came barging in not a minute after Harriet finished frying up three plates of bangers and mash and more bacon than a reasonably sized pig could provide. Dudley was blond like his mother and rotund like his father—more so, in fact. He had all the presence of a garishly colored beach ball, especially in his striped t-shirt already stained with what looked like chocolate on the collar. Harriet wouldn't have held his weight against him if Dudley hadn't of been such a terrible little monster. He and his gang of friends loved to chase her down, and though Harriet was often quick enough to evade him, Dudley had caught and sat on her once. Harriet broke two ribs and spent two days whinging about the pain before Uncle Vernon took her to the emergency room.

Dudley toddled over to the table groaning under the weight of wrapped presents with a gleeful expression on his face. "How many are there?" he demanded of his mother, ignoring Harriet's presence entirely as she slid plates of food onto whatever clear space she could.

"Thirty-seven, Diddykins," Aunt Petunia crooned as she came up behind her son and smoothed his combed hair. He looked a bit like a pig in a wig to Harriet, but she wisely kept her opinion to herself.

If Aunt Petunia expected Dudley to be grateful, she had another thing coming. "I only count thirty-six," he said, sullen color rising in his already pink cheeks. "Thirty-six. That's two less than last year!"

Aunt Petunia went about trying to mitigate the boy's oncoming temper tantrum and Harriet turned a deaf ear to the conversation, going back to the kitchen proper so she could pop a piece of bread into the toaster and slather on some peanut butter. She thought of her own eleventh birthday looming on the horizon, just a month away, and knew there'd be no celebration, no happy affection or hugs or warm kisses on the cheek. There'd be no presents for her, of course. There never were. The Dursleys abhorred spending any amount of money on selfish little _freaks_ like Harriet.

She couldn't help being a freak, if that was indeed what she was. Sometimes odd things occurred around her, odd things that infuriated her aunt and uncle and terrified the daylights out of Dudley. Harriet didn't think it fair for them to blame her, especially since she couldn't explain _why_ these things happened in the first place. Sometimes objects fell off the counter, and she had a sneaking suspicion Set was to blame, though she never caught him in the act. Once, Uncle Vernon's pant leg burst into flame when he stood over Harriet threatening to smack her upside the head for her cheek. Another time the television exploded while Harriet wasn't even in the room, though she had been fervently hoping someone would turn the roaring volume down.

They could hardly blame _her_ for such oddities. It wasn't like someone could set people on fire with their mind.

Though, to be honest, Harriet rather liked the idea; she thought the Dursleys could benefit from having the seat of their pants set alight every now and then.

The phone rang and Aunt Petunia tutted about solicitors interrupting breakfast as she got up and went to answer the handheld. At the counter, Harriet polished off the last bit of her toast and looked glumly down at the crumbs on the plate. She'd go for a second piece if she didn't think her relatives would snatch it right out of her hands for being greedy.

"Bad news, Vernon," Aunt Petunia said as she returned, her face scrunched in a look of displeasure. "The old woman just called. She can't take the girl; something about a broken leg."

Harriet perked up. The "old woman" in question was Mrs. Figg, an elderly widow who lived the next block over on Wisteria Walk and had a mildly obscene obsession with cats. The Dursleys left Harriet with the woman whenever they went on vacation or somewhere exciting, not that Harriet minded much. She imagined even the best places would be atrocious in the company of her relatives, and Mrs. Figg was nice enough. She was odd, but Harriet liked off things and odd people. Sometimes she gave Harriet leftover cake.

As Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon argued, Dudley threw a right fit about "not wanting _her_ to come," his voice ringing in the confines of the house. Apparently they had an outing at the zoo planned for today. Harriet loved animals and, for a moment, the thought of going to the zoo sounded fascinating—until she saw the look in Dudley's piggy eyes as he glared at her over Aunt Petunia's shoulder.

No, going to the zoo would be a bloody nightmare in the making.

"I'm supposed to do the garden today," she said aloud, raising her voice high enough to be heard above their yelling. The Dursleys stared, Uncle Vernon quickly approaching a shade near violet. "So I could, err, just do that while you're gone?"

Her aunt and uncle exchanged pointed looks, Uncle Vernon seemingly pleased with the idea, Aunt Petunia more suspicious of Harriet's motives. "We can lock her out in the garden," Vernon said softly, hand on Petunia's arm. "It's a pleasant enough day out, plenty of water—a day of chores will do the lazy runt some good."

Harriet almost— _almost_ —rolled her eyes. Rolling one's eyes was quite high on the list of things one _shouldn't_ do if they didn't want to get swatted.

Aunt Petunia fretted a bit more, Dudley's great, heaving sobs cutting off with haste when the doorbell rang and Petunia went to greet Piers Polkiss, Dudley's best mate. Uncle Vernon quickly ushered Harriet out the back door while Aunt Petunia was distracted. The lock engaged behind Harriet with a decisive snap.

A different little girl may have been terrified of being shut out in the yard for much of the day, but Harriet was quite enthused. She sat on the porch steps with the morning sun hot on her head, listening to the voices inside dwindle, then shift out into the front. She could hear Uncle Vernon's booming laugh, then the clap of car doors coming closed. A minute later, the engine to Uncle Vernon's brand new company car turned over, and the wheels rumbled on the asphalt as the Dursleys drove away.

Harriet's shoulders slumped. From the bushes came a rustle of broken twigs.

" _Ssspeaker_."

A voice rose from the bed of Aunt Petunia's prized violets. Harriet hopped off the porch steps and crouched in the grass, her arms around her knees as she peeked through the bright leaves and saw a slender body slide through the mulch. " _Ssspeaker_ ," the little grass snake said again as it raised its narrow head.

Ever since she was young, Harriet had been able to understand snakes. They sought her out for conversation and addressed her by the assumed title " _Speaker_." Harriet didn't know what a Speaker was—well, aside from the obvious. She didn't know why she was different in that regard and simply decided it was yet another odd factoid on the ever-increasing list of reasons why Harriet Potter was not normal. Next to having a sentient shadow and occasionally sparking accidental fires, Harriet considered chatting with snakes a rather tame quirk.

" _Hello_ ," Harriet said. " _You have pretty scales_." She had learned early on that the smallest snakes usually weren't overly bright and were only good for short bursts of conversation.

" _Thank you, Ssspeaker_ ," the snake replied, swaying as if mesmerized. Another snake moved in the bushes and addressed Harriet, their sibilant voices twining together as they hissed out that title again and again. Harriet wondered what it was like to be a snake. Would it be better than living here, at Privet Drive? Maybe. Maybe not. Harriet didn't think she'd much like the taste of mice or bugs, so she had better stay a little girl.

" _There's some crickets in the hedge, you know_ ," Harriet told the little snakes, pointing out the boxwood off by the locked garden gate. " _Should be enough for both of you_."

Both little snakes thanked her before zooming away like flickers of light in the parched grass. She was feeling rather maudlin about the day, as she always did around holidays and special occasions, but Harriet decided everything really wasn't all that bleak. In fact, she was looking forward to the start of the new school year; she'd be attending Stonewall High, a local state secondary school, and for the first time in her life wouldn't be in class with her bullying cousin. Dudley had gotten into Uncle Vernon's old public school, Smeltings. Harriet wouldn't have to see Dudley for almost ten months while he was away.

Smiling, Harriet stretched herself out on the lawn, feeling the warmth of the earth press into her back as her shadow stretched long at her side and one of the grass snakes returned, its hissing muffled by a mouthful of cricket. It wound about her ankles, and though the pressure of the thin body felt odd and ticklish, Harriet thought it comforting.

"Things are going to get better. I'm going to make friends and do my best and Dudley won't be about to stop me!" she said to no one in particular, though Set did spool around her in a great black circle. He spiraled in feathery coils not unlike those of a giant snake. "Everything is going to be alright."

Set pooled through the upturned blades of grass and seemed to go on forever.

* * *

 **Disclaimer: I do not own the _Harry Potter_ franchise or any of its recognizable elements. This is a fan-made recreation of the original series made for fun, not for profit. Please support the official release.**


	2. under the stairs

_**ii. under the stairs**_

Everything, Harriet understood, was not _alright_. Truly Harriet knew the way she lived was not proper; no other girl at her primary lived in a boot cupboard or wore hand-me-downs of such ridiculous proportions. No one else went hungry at lunch time because they didn't have pocket change and no one else seemed baffled by simple affection like Harriet was. The only time she ever remembered being hugged was in her third year, when she told Mrs Richards the Dursleys didn't give her dinner and wouldn't let her have a better blanket and Dudley kept pinching her arms until they were black and blue. The Dursleys told Mrs Richards that Harriet was a horrid liar and the teacher never hugged her again.

Harriet didn't realize she wasn't being properly treated until she started first form. Then she learned that "nasty little burdens" aren't actually something you should call children, let alone a blood relative, and for all their vaunted respect of _normalcy_ , the Dursleys were perfectly abnormal in their care for poor Harriet. Still, she liked to tell herself " _Everything will be alright_ " from time to time, liked to dream her parents would pop up out of the blue and say there had been a mistake, they'd survived the car accident that had supposedly killed them, or a long-lost relation would arrive on the doorstep of Number Four to whisk Harriet away. " _Everything will be alright"_ she told herself, and soon Harriet hoped that wish would come true.

Her life changed on a balmy summer day midway through July. It was an innocuous day like any number before it; Aunt Petunia banged on the cupboard door, Harriet stirred herself from unpleasant dreams and set about making breakfast. She fried up the eggs and potatoes, serving the family before she took her own seat at the table and picked over a bowl of stale granola. Dudley sat across from her in his new Smeltings uniform. He looked so ridiculous, Harriet had to hide her laughter in well-timed coughs.

She didn't find the knobbly Smeltings stick very funny, however. Why a school thought it necessary to give young boys sticks for whacking each other was beyond Harriet's comprehension.

A clatter in the hall signaled the post's arrival.

"Get the mail, Dudley."

"Make _her_ get it."

"Go on then, girl."

Harriet set aside her granola and rose from the table. Dudley aimed a whack toward her leg with his stick and she dodged, scrunching her nose up in derision as she passed him by. Her cousin scowled. Really, Harriet couldn't even begin to guess what life at Privet Drive would be like without Dudley constantly hounding her. Maybe Aunt Petunia wouldn't be so cold if Dudley wasn't near by for her to smother with her unfettered love. Not that Harriet thought _she_ should be smothered instead. She knew her aunt was capable of being nice if she wished to be; she simply never seemed to have the inclination.

She dragged her feet over to where the letters lay on the mat and picked them up. There were several bills, a postcard from Vernon's sister "Aunt" Marge, who was staying on the Isle of Wight—and _a letter for Harriet_.

Frozen, Harriet almost dropped the thick envelope as she turned it about in her hands and reread the addressee.

 _Miss H. D. Potter_

 _The Cupboard Under the Stairs_

 _4 Privet Drive_

 _Little Whinging_

 _Surrey_

A sound of disbelief left Harriet. There was her name, plain as you please, written in a lovely green ink on a pricey piece of parchment with a purple wax seal on the back. She examined the seal and saw some kind of crest embedded in the wax, though the details were a bit difficult to decipher. There was a large ' _H_ ' in the middle. Who in the world would write to her? Was this some type of new viral marketing? If so, how did they know where she _slept_?

"What are you doing, girl? Checking for letter bombs?" Uncle Vernon chuckled at his own joke.

"Oh, har har," Harriet muttered. "Ripping good joke, ol' chap." Hesitating, she stuck the letter into the voluminous pocket of her cousin's oversized shorts and went to take the rest of the mail in. Uncle Vernon grunted as she set the stack of post by his elbow on the table. She retreated to her chair, feeling the sharp corners of her letter poke at her thigh as she sat and finished her granola. Dudley eyed her like Harriet was an ugly bug he wanted to squish.

"Marge is ill," Uncle Vernon said, flipping over the postcard. "Ate a funny whelk."

"Oh, dear."

Breakfast was finished in short order and Harriet cleared the table. She continued to touch the outside of her shorts even while she washed the dishes, leaving the occasional smudge of soap on the fabric, her head full of questions. What if it was someone who knew of Harriet? What if they were writing to tell her they wanted to take her away? She didn't know if that was possible, but she surely wished it so.

Once the last bowl had been dried and neatly stacked on its shelf, Harriet scampered off. She didn't want Aunt Petunia to call her back with another list of chores and she had long since learned that out of sight was out of mind when it came to her relatives. She paused in the hall by her cupboard door, listening to Dudley jabber on to his parents about wanting to go visit his mates, then slipped the envelope out of her pocket once more.

A second inspection proved to be just as mystifying as the first. Harriet ran her thumb across the wax again, frowning, then gently pried it open. From inside she pulled free two sheets of soft, yellow parchment, gleaming with the same green ink as the envelope.

HOGWARTS SCHOOL _of_ WITCHCRAFT _and_ WIZARDRY

Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore

 _(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc.,  
Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)_

 _Dear Miss Potter,_

 _We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment._

 _Term begins on 1 September. We await your owl by no later than 31 July._

 _Yours sincerely,_

 _Minerva McGonagall_

 _Deputy Headmistress_

"What in the world?" Harriet murmured as her brow furrowed. She gave the second sheet a quick inspection and did, in fact, find a list of books by people she had never heard of and a motley collection of the oddest sounding things. Potions kits and cauldrons? Telescopes and scales? Was this _real_? Was there really a school for _witchcraft?_ Harriet had never applied to such a place. Her aunt and uncle would have screamed themselves hoarse if she'd asked.

Harriet reached for the cupboard door. She would've opened her letter inside, but the cupboard lacked any kind of light and became decidedly dark once the door was slammed shut. Her fingers skirted the latch when— _SMACK_!

"Ouch!" Harriet cried as she jerked her hand back, no longer alone. She looked around to see that Dudley—holding his Smeltings stick—had left the kitchen and to come sneaking into the hall, no doubt looking for some retribution after his earlier nagging attempts had failed. His narrowed eyes landed on the folded parchment Harriet clutched to her chest, and before she could think of what to do, her cousin sucked in a gust of air and shouted. "Mum, Dad! She's got a something! The freak's got something!"

Uncle Vernon came stomping through the doorway, mustache twitching. He glared at Harriet as she hid the letter behind her back, her throat gone dry and her head fuzzy as her uncle loomed overhead and her heart kicked her ribs.

"Well?" he said with his meaty hand out held. "Give it here."

Harriet took a step back. Dudley, having shuffled to the side to give his father room, made a grab for the letter and Harriet dodged—right into Uncle Vernon's hands. He gripped her wrist with considerable force as he brought her arm forward. One of the pages tore when he jerked it from her grasp.

"What's this then? Some garbage you nicked from school—?"

Uncle Vernon suddenly went very pale and still. His beady eyes flickered back and forth, back and forth, faster and faster. Harriet reached for the letter and he jerked his arm higher out of her reach. "Petunia! Petunia, get in here!"

A pause, then came the sharp _clack, clack_ of Aunt Petunia's heels as the door swung open to admit the horse-faced woman. "Yes, Vernon, what is it?"

He shook the rumpled parchment in his fist. Aunt Petunia didn't even read the letter; she looked at what he was holding, at the fine paper and the wax seal hanging off the envelope's flap, and choked. She wheeled on Harriet.

" _Where did you get that?!_ " she demanded, hissing like one of the garden snakes. "How _dare_ you! Have you been in contact with those freaks? Have you been out sending owls where the neighbors can see you like the nasty little sneak you are?!"

"Owls?" Harriet weakly asked, feeling quite out of her depth. Aunt Petunia seemed to know a lot more about all this than poor Harriet did. It was almost as if—. "Hang on. What do you know about all this? Have you gotten one of these letters before?"

Aunt Petunia paled like Uncle Vernon. "Don't— _don't_ ask questions," she gasped. Of course, that was one of the first rules Harriet had learned at Privet Drive; don't ask questions. Especially stupid ones.

At the moment, Harriet was _not_ inclined to follow that particular rule. Her relatives' reactions led her to believe they knew exactly what that letter was on about and where it had come from. Harriet thought it might have all been a big joke, but Dursleys didn't _like_ jokes, not unless they were told by Uncle Vernon and had vaguely racist undertones to them. The Dursleys _knew_.

"Do you know that lady who sent it? Or about this Hog—Hogwarts place?"

"Don't—," Uncle Vernon sputtered as a red flush began to overcome his pallor.

Harriet thought about all the odd things that occurred in the house, her strange shadow and the chats she had with the snakes who came searching for her at Number Four. "Am I a—a _witch_? Do I have ma—?"

"DON'T!" Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia thundered in unison. Both Harriet and Dudley slapped their hands over their ears, frightened by the sudden explosion of sound. "Don't you _dare_ say that word!"

"Is it true, then—?"

Aunt Petunia jerked the cupboard door open with such force the hinges groaned. "Get into you cupboard. No more questions—."

"But what about—?"

" _No!_ "

With his hand still on Harriet's arm, Uncle Vernon jerked her forward and stuffed her inside the cupboard. Harriet struggled, reaching for her letter, not wanting him to take it away—.

Then the door slammed shut, and Harriet heard the latch slide home.


	3. touch of the unholy

_**iii. touch of the unholy**_

Not terribly far from the dark cupboard beneath the stairs of Number Four, Privet Drive, lived another little girl quite like Harriet Potter. That is to say, she was a girl who the Dursleys, convinced of their own exemplary ordinariness, would not think normal in the slightest.

Elara Black couldn't help being odd. There simply hadn't been a chance for normality in her upbringing; living in a place like St. Giles' Institute of Wiltshire often precluded such pleasantries. Matron Fitzgerald—hunched and scowling, limping with a cane that thumped loud on the hollow floorboards—woke the children at six o'clock, led them through their morning prayers, and set them to their lessons with one of the younger sisters. Lessons were interspersed with chores, and sometimes a light game of football in the courtyard. After vespers they sat down in the dining hall and Father Phillips led the children in saying grace.

If one was very, very lucky, they never had to see Father Phillips outside of dinner or Sunday mass. They never got called into his office.

Elara was never lucky.

Terrible things just _happened_ to Elara and to those around her. She had a predilection for causing mayhem without meaning to, without raising a single hand or uttering a single word. The roses in the courtyard withered to blackened stubs after Elara helped Sister Abigail trim the buds, and she once wished Mandy Tibbs would fall off a ladder and she _did_. Kaleb Sanders got sick after pushing her down the stairs and he spent time in hospital, attached to all manner of strange tubes and a ventilator. Elara almost cried when she saw him. She knew it was somehow her fault.

" _She's cursed_ ," the other children whispered behind their hands. " _Elara's got the devil in her. Black as her name_."

Elara didn't think she believed in the devil, or demons, or any of that nonsense. As far as she was concerned, the "devil" existed all around them; he resided in Sister Mattie's too-strong grip, in the side of Matron Fitzgerald's cane, in Father Phillips sharp tongue, and maybe even in Elara, too, though whatever resentment festered in her heart had been born and bred by others, not by herself. She never meant to hurt anyone—not the garden, not the other children, not the sisters who were too loud and too fast with the backs of theirs hands. She mights be cursed, but it wasn't her doing.

The summer heat sank into Elara's back as she leaned against the brick wall and lifted gray eyes to the empty sky overhead. Voices echoed in the confines of the garden walls, younger children playing in the sand pit or among the overgrown weeds hemming the parched lawn. Elara sat behind the hedge, on the little strip of rough concrete separating the dirt from the property's dividing wall, the air always smelling faintly of cigarettes from the eldest kids smoking where the sisters couldn't see. They didn't mind if Elara sat there; the children on the cusp of adulthood really stopped believing in curses and devils and God a long time ago, after all.

Elara was a thin girl, considerably tall for her age and "passably pretty," as Matron Fitzgerald always said, though the Matron believed Elara had best join the convent and not fuss with finding a husband when she was older, lest her demons get the better of her. She was too pale and always outgrew her dresses too fast, much to the consternation of the sisters, and she was prone to terrible bouts of motion sickness. She kept her black hair consigned to a tight bun on the back of her head and liked to wash her hands far more than the other children her age. Elara thought herself quite plain, really. If not for the occasional accident happening in her vicinity, she fancied that no one would ever notice her at all.

Letting out a huff of air, Elara returned her attention to the book bent open on her knee. It was an old bible, battered and torn and water-damaged, resigned to a regretful fate in the bin before Elara salvaged it. She had no love for the scripture—rather the opposite, in fact. Lips pursed in concentration, she used her ink pen to gently black out certain passages and lines, creating mini stories with the words and letters that were left. If one of the sisters found this, Elara's backside would have yet another unfortunate meeting with Matron Fitzgerald's cane.

She pulled at her wool gloves, her hands hot and itchy, but didn't remove the coverings. Sweat prickled on her brow and the back of her dress had a decidedly sticky feel to it. _I should probably go inside_ , she thought, morose at the idea of having to face the others. _I'd rather cook than listen to Sister Mattie snarl psalms in lessons. She could probably fly to Bath with the amount of hot air in her head._

A sudden screech jerked Elara upright. The bible snapped shut on the concrete.

An owl—an honest to goodness owl with rumpled feathers, sharp talons, and a rather cross look in his or her gold eyes—had landed on the wall above Elara's head. Surprised, she stared at the creature and the owl stared right back. Had Elara not been used to "devilish" things happening to her, she would have been a touch nervous to have such a sharp-beaked bird inspecting her like a piece of tasty roadkill.

"Ah," she said, reaching for the bible in case she needed to chuck something at it. "Hello, there."

The bird clacked its beak twice, then jumped down off the wall into the narrow space allocated between the hedges and the bricks. Elara scuffed her shoes scrambling out of the way, and the owl followed her, hopping about on one leg with a displeased hoot. Confused, she realized the poor thing had an envelope tied to its upheld foot, and it insisted on her taking it off. Elara hesitated, then reached out to pull the loop of twine.

The heavy envelope fell and the owl moved away. Under the direct brunt of sunlight, the letters inked in green shone like emeralds.

 _Miss E. A. Black_

 _Bedroom 3, St. Giles' Institute_

 _45 Riversrun Lane_

 _Wilton_

 _Wiltshire_

 _A letter for me?_ Elara pondered as she took the envelope in hand. The thick paper reminded her of the pages in Father Phillips' oldest bible, the one he used for special sermons during the holidays. Nobody had ever written a letter to Elara before. She had no living relations, no friends, not even any cordial acquaintances. She could count on one hand the number of times she'd ever left the orphanage since she'd been left there at almost two years old. _Someone delivered me a letter by…owl? I've heard of carrier pigeons, but not carrier owls, for goodness' sake._

She cracked the purple seal and proceeded to read.

HOGWARTS SCHOOL _of_ WITCHCRAFT _and_ WIZARDRY

Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore

 _(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc.,  
Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)_

 _Dear Miss Black,_

 _We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment._

 _Term begins on 1 September. We await your owl by no later than 31 July._

 _Yours sincerely,_

 _Minerva McGonagall_

 _Deputy Headmistress_

Elara held her breath. A light breeze rippled through the hedge leaves. "It's a test," she managed to choke out past the lump in her throat. "They're trying to test—." Because how could it not be a test? The Matron and Father did so love to try the zeal of their charges, none so much as Elara and her perceived wickedness. " _A fanciful child_ ," they called her when they were being generous, " _a damned heathen"_ when they were not. _Hogwarts? Witchcraft? A confederation of Wizards? What nonsense—?!_

She went to crumple the letter in her fist, frustrated, when the owl gave another haughty hoot.

 _Where did the owl come from?_

Frozen, she forced a breath into her lungs and blinked away the sting of tears. Elara had seen many bizarre things in her short life. She had seen books float on their own accord, flowers shrivel between her fingertips, silverware start to dance, had dreamed about a black haired man who could turn into a great, shaggy dog, and had felt the rekindling of a tiny rapid heartbeat cupped in her hands—but Elara had never seen an owl so uncanny in its intelligence, and had never seen anyone at St. Giles' exhibit even an ounce of the creativity it would take to construct such an elaborate little game.

 _Where would Matron Fitzgerald even get an owl?_ She swallowed, turning the letter and the accompanying list over in her hands. It seemed such a fanciful thing. An ill-tempered bird comes soaring out of the sky to deliver a letter from an academy of magic to a poor orphan girl. For her entire life, the Institute and the church had all but beaten into Elara's head the evils of witchcraft and blasphemy—but by instilling those teachings, were they not confirming their existence? Elara didn't think much of devilry, but what if magic, _real magic_ , existed? Did this letter mean Elara did magic? Was she really and truly cursed?

She wasn't sure, _couldn't_ be sure, and the skeptic in Elara warned her against such silliness. _Would it hurt to reply_? she asked herself, running a finger along the signature of _Minerva McGonagall_. The pen had cut deeply into the paper—parchment—leaving indents.

"Miss Black!"

The voice of a sister carried through the garden from the back door, and Elara tucked the letter and envelope into her bible without hesitation. The owl continued to watch her as Elara rose to her feet and brushed dust from the backside of her skirt. Her socks and Mary Jane shoes were hopelessly dirty. Stealing herself, she looked at the owl, and said, "Just…just wait—or not. Whichever," then hurried off after the call of her name. Her face felt hot with her own embarrassment.

 _Talking to birds now. Maybe I am touched in the head._

Sister Abigail waited for her, holding open the door and the screen against the casual tugging of the wind. She smiled when she saw Elara and her young face creased. "There you are, Miss Black. Father Phillips has been askin' for you."

Elara's heart lurched. "Did—did he say what he wanted?"

"No, not as such." Distracted, Sister Abigail craned her neck to peer by Elara toward the younger kids chasing each other in a game of tag. One of the girls tripped and let out a piercing cry. "Here, you go on, Miss Black, Miss Richardson needs some help over there…."

Elara continued inside on her own, clutching the tattered bible against her chest, the letter and alterations inside like brilliant hot stones she wanted to let go of and hold all the tighter at the same time. Her footsteps echoed in the narrow, crooked halls, a fan droning somewhere behind a shut door, the children either outside or cloistered in the chapel or in the musty classroom listening to Sister Mattie snarl. Elara pushed her panic away, took the trepidation she felt tapping at the inside of her ribcage and shoved it to the back of her mind until she felt reasonably calm. It didn't stop her gloves from sticking to the palms of her hands.

Father Phillips' door lay at the end of the long, twisting corridor. Elara stood before it, and knocked.

"Come in, please."

The door swung in on silent hinges, her steps muffled by the thick rug residing just past the threshold. Silence typified the the priest's office, no radio sitting on the empty bookshelves, no fire in the grate even in the dead of winter, no ticking of a clock on the paneled walls. The rest of the world seemed to get just that much farther away whenever Elara was called into his presence, as if everything beyond St. Giles' just ceased to exist.

"There you are, Elara," Father Phillips said with slight simper from behind his desk, the corners of his mouth pulling at the aged skin of his heavy cheeks. Bushy brows capped his eyes like the white peaks of mountains, though the man himself was a whole and hale fifty in age, his Irish brogue deep and rolling. "And how does God find you today?"

"Very well, Father Phillips."

He gestured at the wooden chair by the covered window and Elara went without protest, her fingers cramping around the bible from their unforgiving grip. He must have sensed her anxiety despite her best efforts, because he laughed. "Oh, you needn't be so anxious, child. I just wanted to check up on you."

"Of course, sir."

"How have you been feeling?"

"Very well, sir."

His gaze trailed over her, hard and disinterested, then lingered on the bible with the slightest bit of warmth. "Have you been doing your readings outside? It's a nice day out. Best to be thankful for the weather before the rains blow back in."

Elara gave her head a quick nod as she stared resolutely at a certificate handing above the wood mantel. She couldn't read it from her angle, and the frame was so thick with dust the letters would have been lost anyway. She didn't want to look at the priest.

Father Phillips stood and came around his desk, his hands folded behind his back, his pace measured and loud in the pressing silence of the office. "Sister Mattie tells me you've been quiet in lessons, and you haven't been eating all your food at supper."

Something tightened in Elara's chest as the priest came to stand before her. Memories weighed on the edges of her thoughts like feet stepping on the hem of a dress, jerking it back, causing her to stumble.

"Now, child, I know you've been through an ordeal, but it's important to keep your strength up. Heaven knows we don't want to be hearing more tales about any _resurrected_ birds, aye?"

The window was covered, but Elara knew that if she were to twitch the curtains aside, she would be able to see the great old willow tree that Elara had avoided looking at ever since _that day_. Flickers of images returned to her: Gunther Lyle with a sparrow in his hand, the other orphans shouting, jeering, crying, a stone coming down, a tiny body broken and thrown into the leaf-strewn roots, bloody feathers sticking to Elara's trembling fingers as she gathered the bird in her hands, feeling the warmth spill through her skin—and she suddenly watched as the dead sparrow took a breath and _flew away_.

The tightening sensation in Elara's chest constricted, and she wanted to tear it free, tear through the cloth and bandages and flesh until she could put her hands on her bones and shake the feeling out. She didn't do that, though. She just laid her bible in her lap and discreetly wrung her hands.

Father Phillips settled his own hand on the top of her head, stroking her hair. "Recovery is a hard road, but I know you have a good soul in you, Elara, and God does not abandon his faithful servants to the treachery of the Devil."

Elara nodded once, numb. She didn't trust herself to speak. From the corner of her eye she saw a glass begin to spin and shudder, coming ever closer to the edge of the priest's desk, and she willed it with everything in her to _stop_ , to stay still. _Please—please, not again, I can't go through THAT again—_.

Too many hands in the dark. The sharp bite of steel in her young flesh, encircling her wrists, the cross glowing red like a shooting star, Father Phillips clutching that special bible of his while he loomed overhead, the silk of his purple stole cool against her skin as it trailed across her tear streaked cheek.

" _Most cunning serpent, you shall no more dare to deceive the human race. We drive you from us, we drive you from us…."_

Shivering, Elara stood and banished the images and voices from her head. She hated that office more than any other place in the orphanage. "Father Phillips, I need to go get ready for my lessons later this afternoon."

"Of course." He straightened, stepping back, and Elara exhaled. "Make sure to study well. We'll have tea in a few days to check up on how you're doing. How does that sound?"

 _Awful_. "Wonderful, sir."

"Excellent. Off you go then."

Elara turned on her heels and hurried from the room, trembling. The sound of glass shattering filled her ears and she broke into a run, the bulbs in the light fixtures bursting as she crossed the hall, dashing up the stairs and into another passage. Elara didn't stop until she was safely ensconced in her bedroom and the door slammed shut behind her on its own.

 _That won't go unpunished_. She stripped off her gloves, then threw them at the wall in a fit of self-indulgent frustration. The room was not very large but it was modestly comfortable, the iron frame of the slim bed cleaned of rust, her sheets firmly tucked, her desk empty of everything aside from a notebook and pen she'd been using earlier that morning to write lines for Sister Mattie. Sunlight streamed through the window, and the silhouette of the wrought-iron bars laid a crooked latticework on her polished floor.

Elara sat on the edge of the mattress and covered her face with her sweaty hands. She was tired of this. She felt as though she lived her life on a tightrope strung between punishments, and no matter how skillfully she managed to cross the gap, her reward was yet another sharp reprimand, another smack with a ruler, another scathing monologue promising Elara Hell waited for her and she would burn for all eternity. She was already burning. Elara Black was eleven years old and yet she felt so, so much older. She could not go on like this.

 _Thwack! Thwack!_

Sitting up, she glanced toward the window where the tapping sound originated. She blinked. The owl that had accosted Elara in the garden now perched on a rung of the bars, sticking its head through the barrier to rap its beak against the glass. She hurried to open it, and the owl gave a rueful hoot as it studied her.

 _Right. Hogwarts_. Elara found the bible laying on her mussed blankets, and she whipped out the letter again, flattening it on the top of her desk.

Magic. That invisible force that welled up inside her and broke light bulbs and cups and returned smashed little birdies to life. She had been told it was evil, that _she_ was evil, for her entire life, but _this_ —.

 _You have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry._

Elara traced the words with her fingers.

 _You have been accepted_.

Hardly daring to breathe, Elara sat at her desk. She pulled her notebook closer and tore out the page of lines, crumpling them until the sentence ' _I will not blaspheme_ ' disappeared into the crinkled paper. Elara picked up her pen, and on the new, fresh page, she began to write: _Dear Deputy Headmistress McGonagall_ ….


	4. but blood is thicker

_**iv. but blood is thicker**_

Harriet's every thought, either waking or dreaming, was consumed by that letter.

Who had sent it? Were all the odd things that happened around her really _magic_? The Dursleys had always hated that word, maybe even more than they hated Harriet herself. They didn't talk about magic and most certainly didn't allow anything fantastical into the house; even Dudley was denied new fantasy computer games, much to his consternation, and Uncle Vernon had burned Harriet's Tolkien books when Aunt Petunia discovered them hidden in the garden shed.

Had the letter met a similar fate? Harriet hoped not.

Shut in her cupboard, she whispered all her questions to Set, and he either didn't answer because he didn't want to, or because she couldn't read shadows in the miserable darkness. Harriet would shut her eyes and listen to the house: the groaning pipes, Dudley playing the telly both upstairs and downstairs, Aunt Petunia nattering on the phone about Mr Lobelia's ugly new hedges. She thought about the dreaded "m" word and her stomach fluttered when she dared to hope she wasn't really a freak at all; rather, she was _magical_. A witch.

The Dursleys, for their part, refused to acknowledge that the letter had ever existed in the first place. Harriet was relegated to the cupboard full time, let out only in the morning and the evening for a spot of food and quick dash to the loo. Perhaps her punishment wouldn't be so severe if she stopped bombarding her aunt and uncle with demands for answers every time they dared cross the hall—but she felt as if she stood upon the cusp of some great change, and hovering there without really _knowing_ anything for certain was like hanging from a noose. The bottom of her toes could scrape the ground, but Harriet was still suffocating all the same. She _needed_ to know there was more to life than this.

Some mornings Harriet woke and it all seemed like another product of her nightmares; a mysterious missive boasting of her acceptance into an academy of magic arrives only to be taken away minutes later. Ridiculous. _I didn't hallucinate_ , she told herself fiercely. She could remember the touch of purple wax giving under her fingertips, the way the green ink shone in the sunshine. She could recite many of the strange names she'd seen listed beneath their strange books, orders to get black uniforms and a pewter cauldron, the ban on first year broomsticks. Though Harriet considered herself quite imaginative, she couldn't have imagined _that_.

One line caused Harriet to worry: " _we await your owl by no later than 31 July_." She hadn't a clue how one went about catching an owl to send a missive—but the rapidly approaching deadline had Harriet anxious. July thirty-first, her birthday. If she failed to send a reply by then, would this Hogwarts place revoke admission? Would they send another letter? Or would Harriet be stuck with the bloody Dursleys until she was eighteen? She was content with her prospects of going to Stonewall High right up until she discovered there could possibly be a school out there that taught _magic_ of all things and it wanted oddball little _Harriet_ to attend. How could she let such a thing go?

Harriet squashed her nose against the cupboard's vent and drew in a long, muffled breath. The air whistled through her nostrils as she breathed, shaking the door, not that she cared about that. A week had passed since the letter's delivery. Harriet had seen very little outside her cupboard since then.

Someone entered the hall—Uncle Vernon, judging by the heavy, plodding tread. The latch on the cupboard rattled as he stooped before it and Harriet leaned back, expectant, preparing for the sudden burst of light that came whenever the door opened. The hinges creaked, and Uncle Vernon—still dressed for work, though his tie had been loosened—glowered at Harriet. She frowned. Harriet had been sure it was still early in the afternoon; she lost time sitting in the cupboard for so long.

"Come eat the dinner your aunt made for you, girl."

Harriet stepped out of the cupboard and stood. She didn't feel very brave with her uncle looming overhead like a great, bulbous blimp of pent-up anger, but she held her ground and squared her bony shoulders. "I want my letter back."

Uncle Vernon didn't reply as he rounded on his heels and stormed into the kitchen. Harriet followed. A plate of cooling scraps from the roast Aunt Petunia had cooked earlier lay at the end of the counter, and the three Dursleys sat around the table picking over their dessert, ignoring her presence entirely. Harriet wanted to set in on them about the letter right away, but her stomach rumbled in protest, and so she slumped over to the spotless counter where her dinner waited and shoved forkfuls of gristle in her mouth. Chewing, she glared out the window facing the garden and studied the burnished color of the sky, the fluffy clouds scudding along the horizon behind the neighbors' houses.

 _What does it even matter? They'll never agree to let me go,_ came Harriet's sullen thought, but she tamped down that pessimistic voice with a determined shake of the head. _No. They have to. I can't stay here and go to Stonewall. I just can't._

Harriet swallowed and went to rinse her plate in the sink. With that finished, she forced herself to stand as tall as she could—which, really, wasn't that tall at all—and turned to face her relatives.

Uncle Vernon saw her coming and stiffened. Aunt Petunia, seeing Uncle Vernon's foul expression, craned her long neck about to level a sour grimace at Harriet. Dudley just kept eating.

"I want my letter," she said, speaking as calmly as she could. "It's my letter, and I think I have a right to know about magic and—."

"The _right_?" Uncle Vernon thundered, jumping to his feet. Harriet took a step back before realizing it. He came nearer, throwing his napkin on the floor as he went. "You don't have the _right_ to anything, you utterly ungrateful freak! We take you in out of the goodness of our hearts, take the clothes off our son's back for you, keep you fed, give you a place to sleep, and _this_ is how you repay us?!"

Aunt Petunia swiftly ushered Dudley out of the room, though the fat boy didn't seem inclined to go, shoving at his mother as he complained. She finally snapped the door shut in his pudgy face and locked it. Fear frazzled the edges of Harriet's temper, and her voice grew louder in response to her uncle's darkening face. "It's not on, keeping this stuff from me! It's my bloody life! It's not fair!"

"It wasn't fair when my stupid sister went and got herself blown up and we go landed with you!" Aunt Petunia burst out, surprising both Harriet and Uncle Vernon. Color burned in her cheeks and her eyes were half wild, glittering like coins at the bottom of a fountain, grubby and dark but catching the light when you least expect them to. "Don't you understand _anything_? That's what magic does to people! It ruins their lives!"

"B—." Harriet sputtered. "Blown up? W-what do you mean ' _blow up_ '? You told me my parents died in a car crash!" Bile crawled into her throat and it was all she could do to stop herself from being sick on their shoes. "How could you lie to me about that?! They're my _parents_! I've never even seen a picture of them!"

"I've heard enough of this—," Uncle Vernon warned, but Harriet kept going.

"What in the hell is wrong with you people?!" she demanded. The windows shook in their casements and though Harriet knew shouting never got her anywhere, she couldn't seem to calm down. She couldn't stop. A headache pulsed behind her temples. "I'm your _niece_ and you treat me worse than Aunt Marge treats her dogs!"

"How dare—!"

"I want my letter! It's mine, and you have no right keeping it from me! I want to go to Hogwarts! I want to learn magic!"

A sudden pain flared through Harriet's face and, before she knew it, she was on the floor, slumped against the kitchen cabinets with one of the knobs digging painfully in her shoulder. With a dazed blink, she looked up at Uncle Vernon—just as the man lunged, wrapping his meaty fingers around Harriet's skinny neck to haul her upright. He squeezed until Harriet couldn't breathe, terror ripping through her like water through a broken dam and Uncle Vernon shook his arms. Yells punctuated each shake.

" _You—don't—talk—to—me—like—that!"_

"Vernon— _Vernon!_ You can't _do_ that!" Aunt Petunia shrieked. He dropped Harriet as swiftly as he had grabbed her, both breathing hard, Harriet swaying on her feet. With a trembling hand, she touched her throbbing lip and held bloody fingers out toward the light. The red looked ghastly on her skin. Harriet was stunned. Getting punched by Dudley or receiving a few slaps about the head for her cheek wasn't a rare occurrence at Privet Drive—but the Dursleys had never _struck_ her before. Not like this.

Uncle Vernon quivered with rage, and Harriet knew in that instant he wished he'd killed her, that if Aunt Petunia hadn't of been here, he would have kept squeezing and squeezing until every last breath left Harriet's scrawny little body. She had never been so afraid of the man before.

He grabbed her by the front of her overlarge shirt like he was afraid to touch her skin now and dragged Harriet toward the hall. "I will hear _no more_ of this!" he roared, throwing open the door, Dudley almost falling in face first from having his ear pressed to the keyhole. A moment later and Uncle Vernon had the cupboard door open, too, the dark inside waiting as it always was to swallow Harriet whole. Her head struck one of the shelves with enough force to bruise when he threw her in. Uncle Vernon slammed the door closed again. "Get in there, and see if we let you out before _Christmas!_ "

 **xXxXx**

Harriet sobbed. She sobbed long after Uncle Vernon had stormed away, long after Dudley's laughter had subsided, and long after the Dursleys had tromped up the stairs to their beds. Aunt Petunia hesitated once outside Harriet's cupboard and had enough compassion in her to open the vent, but she moved on quick enough at Uncle Vernon's insistence. Weak afternoon sunlight gave way to the gloaming hour. Harriet watched the light die through watery eyes. She had never been so miserable before in all her life.

Some time after night fell, Harriet dropped into a fitful doze, curled up tight in ball upon her cot, dreaming of green light and cold laughter and shifting shadows. She didn't think about Hogwarts, about magic, her letter, or her parents. It hurt too much, worse than the pain in her lip or in her bruised neck or her bumped head. What else had the Dursleys lied to her about all these years?

A hard poke pulled Harriet from her lousy dreams. She lay on her cot and tried to breathe through her stuffy nose, wondering if she had imagined the feeling—until it came again. For one horrible second Harriet thought someone else was in the bloody cupboard with her, but no, she was quite alone. Set was the one trying to rouse her.

Harriet sat up—avoided bashing her skull on the riser—and stuffed her glasses onto her blotchy face. She couldn't see very well, but she could _hear_ , and what she heard was the distinct sound of the cupboard's latch sliding along its groove. Harriet watched, frozen, as the door popped itself open and slowly swung aside. In the soft moonlight suffusing the hall, the shadows wheeled and pulsed until Harriet saw Set's hand take form, beckoning her forward from the cupboard's belly. She went.

No one was in the silent hallway. Set moved, illuminated by the light coming through the windows that flanked the front door, his black form stretching and distorting as he edged his way up the stairs. _What is he on about?_ Harried marveled, still crouched down. A door creaked open. Set returned before she could consider following, not that Harriet was keen on following him upstairs to where her relatives slept. His shadow rippled on each step as it came down, Aunt Petunia's handbag floating silently along with him.

"What are you…?"

Set brought the bag to Harriet, then flipped it over. Aunt Petunia's things clattered on the floor, a tube of lipstick rolling away, loose change bouncing and spinning as Set tossed crumpled tissues and sweet wrappers aside. There, among the detritus, was Harriet's letter. She took hold of it, gaping, and saw that someone had obviously tried to set the pages alight, but had ultimately failed. The edges were crispy and left ash on her questing fingertips.

Set broke open Aunt Petunia's purse and extricated the folded notes, flinging them in Harriet's face. She caught the money on instinct more than anything else and gawked, having never held more than a few quid in her hands before. Set moved again, and the front door slammed open. The evening breeze whispered through the space, cool with the first distant murmurs of autumn held in its grasp, inviting Harriet to take one breath, and then another. Her cheeks felt chilled where the tears dried themselves.

Harriet glanced at the money in one hand, at the letter in the other, and then the open door.

Set pointed toward the exit.

Her heart was beating very quickly at this point, because Harriet understood perfectly what Set meant for her to do, but she wasn't sure she could. Harriet wasn't even yet eleven years old, and though she despised this place, Privet Drive was the only refuge she had ever known. Bitter and hateful, but a refuge all the same. The unknown was a terrifying thing, and it waited for young Harriet now, yawning like a great maw beyond the threshold of the open door where the night lay thick like dew on the lawn. The world was very quiet then. Harriet could hear her heartbeat.

Her legs wobbled when she stood. Set twisted about her feet as Harriet walked toward the open door, her hands coming to rest on the frame, shoes scuffing the threshold though they did not cross it.

In her head, she could hear the Dursleys shouting again. " _You don't have the right to anything."_

" _That's what magic does to people!"_

" _Ungrateful freak."_

" _It ruins their lives!_ "

Harriet stepped forward. _They won't hold me down anymore,_ she told herself. _Not again. I'm not afraid._

Hissing voices rose from the grass. " _Misstresss_ ," the snakes called as she walked them by. " _Misstresss_."

The yard teemed with dozens of slender, glistening bodies writhing in a chaotic mass of scales and sharp teeth and wavering tongues. As she leapt over the low garden wall, the snakes began to pour into the open door of Number Four, Privet Drive. Harriet Potter followed the pointing arm of her shadow gesturing into the night and she smiled as she walked away.


	5. bind thy hands

_**v. bind thy hands**_

The vial shattered when it hit the floor.

Albus Dumbledore stared at it, at the jagged triangles of glass peppering his rug and the blue swirls of Pain Relief seeping into the fibers—but Severus stared instead at his hand held aloft like it was some ghastly appendage he'd never seen before.

 _It happened again. Fuck._

The Headmaster wore an uncharacteristically stern expression behind his silvered beard as he surveyed his Potions Master. "Are you alright, Severus?"

"Fine," Severus replied automatically, which was true enough. The initial flare of pain had faded after his fingers spasmed and had dulled to something less incandescent than an outright inferno. Now the ache settled deeper in the muscles and bones, leaving behind nothing to indicate his hand and wrist had been in searing agony only moments before.

 _What the bloody hell is that?_

Dumbledore flicked his wand toward the broken vial and it repaired itself, though the potion it'd contained couldn't be salvaged. Another spell Vanished the remainder of the mess. "Are you certain, my boy?"

Severus tore his eyes away from his hand, lip curling as he addressed the Headmaster. "I assure you, I am perfectly fine. Your _concern_ is unnecessary."

Lips pursed, Albus settled once more in his armchair, tucking his wand away in the inner fold of his gaudy robes. His left hand came to rest on his lap while the sleeve of his right rippled, empty.

"Ah, Severus," he sighed, a weary chuckle hidden beneath the breath. "I guess even you are entitled to a moment of clumsiness."

The Potions Master said nothing. _It wasn't clumsiness_. He didn't admit as much to Albus, because though he may detest the simpering fool's well-wishing and soft-hearted nagging, he was loathe to give the old man anything more to worry about. If it _was_ anything to worry about at all. Severus sank farther into the crimson cushions of his own chair, glaring at the small fire built in the gaping hearth.

"Are you prepared for classes to commence in September?" Dumbledore asked. He reached for the bowl of tart sweets resting on a short, spindly table by his elbow and the bowl obliged him by sliding nearer.

"Nearly," Severus said.

"And are you ready for…certain students to make their appearance?" The knowing look Dumbledore leveled over his half-moon spectacles was not appreciated and Severus told him as much, his irritation mounting as he forced his hand to lay flat on his thigh. The fingers continued to twitch. He had seen similar damage done to nerves with the Cruciatus Curse, and yet Severus _knew_ this was not a result of that spell.

"Of course," he sneered, eyes still on the fire. "The wretched year has come at last. We're to be blessed with the presence of _the Boy Who Lived_. Tell me, where did he spend his summer studying again?"

"France, I believe, but I'm not certain. I would have to write Augusta and ask." Dumbledore sucked on a lemon drop and, for an instant, appeared deep in thought. A somber expression arrested the usual twinkle of his eyes. "Neville is not the only child of whom I speak, though."

Severus said nothing. In fact, he pretended he hadn't heard.

Dumbledore persisted. "Are you excited to see Harriet again?"

He ground his teeth. _Bloody meddlesome fucking fool_. "Has her letter been sent?"

"Yes, it went with the rest of them, or so Minerva tells me."

"And there hasn't been any… _issues_?"

Stroking his beard, Dumbledore contemplated his reply before saying, "The charm on the paper tells Minerva that young Harriet opened and read her letter. She's simply waiting for a reply now."

Severus eyed the darkening sky outside the window and his hand gave a painful throb. "If _Petunia_ doesn't have the girl respond by the thirty-first, I'll go visit the Muggles myself."

Dumbledore's beard twitched in what either could have been a smile or a frown. It was impossible to tell. Around them the silver mechanisms and multi-colored dials continued to swivel and chime, providing ambiance to the stilted conversation unraveling between the pair of wizards. "Now, Severus…you know you would attract the _wrong_ kind of attention should you go to investigate yourself. I'm sure they're merely waiting for the opportunity to go to Diagon and use the owl service in the alley. Young Harriet will be coming to Hogwarts; I told Petunia and her husband as such when I left Harriet in their charge."

"You shouldn't have left her there," he retorted, knowing exactly type of " _wrong attention"_ the Headmaster spoke of, not caring what that _particular_ sadistic arsehole thought for once.

"There was no one else."

" _Anyone_ would have been better, Headmaster." He knew that. He knew that with every fiber of his being, no matter that Albus always said " _People are capable of change_." The Headmaster could be blinded by the vaunted light gleaming off his own pretty pure morals. Severus had been born in spite, and he'd recognized its mirror in _Tuney_ when they were just children. Petunia had loved Lily once, and so Severus could only hope to God or to Merlin or to fucking Morgana that she'd done right by her sister, but the Potions Master was a cynical man by nature. People didn't change. The girl's life had probably been uncomfortable in Petunia's ugly hands.

He prayed she had something of Lily in her. He couldn't _stand_ suffering another seven years with a miniature James Potter.

"Anyone, my boy? So you would have taken Harriet in?"

"Don't be ridiculous," Severus scoffed. Snape could have barely taken care of himself let alone a child, especially a child whose mother had been so recently murdered. He didn't like to admit how many nights he'd spent pathetically drunk in his quarters, seated with his back to the wall, because _that's where freaks sit, boy_ , the fire banked low and the cold seeping through his night clothes. To this day, he still thought of Lily—sans the drinking now—and of their last meeting.

She'd been holding a swaddled bundle to her chest and had asked if he'd wanted to hold her, but Severus had declined, because _what in the hell did he know about holding babies_? She told him she forgave him, that she understood all that Severus did for them—for Lily and her bastard of a husband and that tiny lump of a newborn she clutched so protectively, but Severus retorted, " _It's not enough. It'll never be enough_." Lily was all that was good in the world, and sometimes Severus thought she would've forgiven the Dark Lord if the maniac bent his knee and bowed his head in repentance.

Smiling, Lily said there was only one thing in the world she cared about, and he would care about it too, if he meant to keep Lily in his life.

He remembered kneeling on the parlor floor, clasping Lily's wrist, her hand on his own, James Potter's wand hovering over them.

" _Will you, Severus, always do your best by her_?"

" _I will._ "

"Severus?"

" _If the worst should come to pass, will you keep her from danger?_ "

" _I will_."

"Severus, my boy, are you listening?"

The Potions Master lifted his gaze from the grate and dismissed the nagging sensation tickling the back of his mind. The remainder of the Vow seemed to echo in the air between the pops and snaps of the fire and the whir of delicate instruments. " _Will you protect my daughter, the person I love most in this world, if I cannot, Severus Snape?_ "

" _I will_."

He never saw her again after that day—neither her, nor Potter, nor her daughter. September would be the first time he'd seen Harriet Potter since her infancy, since he'd reluctantly stepped over her mother's cooling corpse to approach the bloody cradle and pour Essence of Dittany over her weeping wounds. The mewling brat had been the only thing that stopped him from turning heel and chasing down his _Lord_ that very night. He'd sat in the ruins cradling a wounded babe, sobbing his blasted eyes out, until Sirius Black—that _fucking_ traitor—arrived on his flying motorcycle.

He and Severus probably would have cursed each other to bits if Hagrid hadn't shown up and almost killed him by smacking Snape in the back of the head. The Potions Master woke several days later in the hospital wing, only to learn that Black had escaped, had murdered Pettigrew and a shite ton of Muggles, and that Neville bloody Longbottom was being heralded as " _the Boy Who Lived_ " after the Dark Lord supposedly vanished into thin air right in the middle of casting the curse that would have destroyed the sniveling boy.

Lily—his Lily—her husband, and their scarred little girl had been relegated as little more than footnotes in a madman's murderous rampage. Harriet's survival had been attributed to a simple mistake on the Dark Lord's part, a stroke of luck that hid her in the ruins of her home from his attentions. Severus knew better. So did Dumbledore.

He rummaged in his robes, searching for another Pain Relief, but came up empty handed. "Apologies, Headmaster," he drawled. "I need to return to my stores to find you another analgesic potion."

Dumbledore waved aside the subject change. "That's not necessary, Severus. I will get one from Poppy if I need to."

"Her stores are out of date. I haven't yet restocked the infirmary. In fact, I should see to that now." Severus rose, straightening the fall of his robes as he did so, refusing to meet the Headmaster's persistent stare.

"I get the distinct impression you're trying to avoid this conversation."

Severus lifted a brow in mock surprise. "Who, _me_?" He then made good on his escaped and pretended he didn't hear Dumbledore's chuckling at his back.

 **xXxXx**

Severus couldn't remember the last time he'd laughed.

It was a rather stupid thought in his opinion, though he'd been having more and more of these stupid thoughts the closer September crept and the more he remembered Lily Evans and the misspent years of his youth. He'd laughed without mirth before, to be certain, cold and snide and sarcastic, a quick burst of reviled derision passing through him like the snarl of a wounded animal. He must have been very young—that is, if he'd ever laughed at all. He couldn't be certain.

Hearing Dumbledore's amusement, how easily it came to the ancient wizard, rankled Severus's already pained and agitated mood, because he stood before the sink in his quarters downing the strongest Pain Relief he had and _still_ his hand ached, thinking about fucking Dumbledore and his bloody twinkling eyes. Sometimes Severus really hated him. The Headmaster reminded Snape of how little humanity the Potions Master still retained.

Water splashed over his hand. In the low, greenish light of the dungeons, it looked as if it belonged to a dead man. Severus snorted. The pain had been reoccurring for several years now, sometimes only as a slight ache he'd attributed to the cold, or—on rare occasions—as a sudden spear of unadulterated agony ripping through his flesh and bones. It never lasted long, yet the echo of it remained, mystifying and terrible, a fucking promise and threat Severus had never found the cause of.

He lifted his gaze to the mirror above the sink. The visage held there was just as it ever was: stark and severe, two eyes like unlit wells boring deep into the earth, black and glinting, nose sharp and cheeks gaunt, lips a displeased slash above a hard jaw. His skin was remarkably, well, _unmarked_ considering his prior profession and the time he spent around idiot children wielding knives and bad tempers. There were, however, several scars clustered about the orbital ridge and cheekbone of his left eye, interrupting the dark hair of his brow and the fringe of black lashes. Sneering, Severus lifted his hand to gently prod at the eye.

The glass was cool beneath his fingertip.

 _The pain's not from that_ , he told himself as he inspected the lid and blinked, looking for any abnormalities in the Charmed orb. He knew the curse that had taken his eye would eventually blind the other eye as well, but Severus also knew he'd most likely be dead by then, so he didn't bloody care about that. Whatever malignancy persisted there wouldn't manifest in his hand or wrist.

Frustrated, he used his wand to douse the lights and returned to the main living area. He had a great many things to see to—potions to brew for the infirmary, for his own stores, responsibilities to shirk and other professors to avoid, journals he wanted to read and correspondences in desperate need of being returned—but Severus ignored those tasks and settled in the armchair by the hearth. He glared into the depths of the twisting flames and, layer by meticulous layer, submerged his worthless thoughts and furious emotions into the hungering abyss of his Occluded mind.

Severus lifted his hand and stared at it. He stared at the way the firelight played across the sallow skin and caught upon the barely there etching left by Lily Potter's Unbreakable Vow.

"It's not the Vow," he whispered, not for the first time. "That's not…that's not how it works."

But what did he really know?

Sometime after dark, long after irritable Potions Masters should have retired to their beds, the pain suddenly stopped.


	6. the mind of the clever

_**vi. the mind of the clever**_

Hermione Granger was a girl who, since her earliest days, had been told she was " _too"_ much.

Naturally Hermione knew it was possible to have too much of something, and it could be just as detrimental as having too little—but the things of which Hermione was accused of being too much of never made much sense at all to the bushy-haired, bright-eyed girl. The other children in her primary told her she was _too_ bossy, and the teachers often grumbled that she was _too_ clever, _too_ well-prepared, _too_ attentive. " _Hermione_ , _why don't we give someone else a chance_?" they'd say, and while Hermione fully believed in being fair, nobody else ever wanted to _try._

Even her parents, through tight smiles and gentle touches, would say " _Dear, you can be a bit too much sometimes_."

 _Too, too, too_.

Hermione never had any patience for that silly little adverb. Why on _earth_ would people say "be the best you can be" and then tell her that her best was "too much"?

It was an absolutely ridiculous double-standard. Hermione was clever, though, clever enough to know that sometimes it was best not to be _too much_ , no matter how it stung her pride and wounded something deep inside her. Jean and Robert Granger were always so pleased when their daughter pretended to be intrigued by the simple revisions offered by her teachers, when all Hermione wanted was to study something more challenging, read something more engaging, and move at a pace that wasn't so infuriatingly slow.

Sometimes, Hermione had to pretend to be an idiot and she resented the world when that happened.

So when a stern older woman dressed in a tartan suit and a pair of square spectacles arrived at the Granger household in July and told Hermione " _You're a witch_ ," Hermione didn't dismiss her out of hand. She sat, and she listened.

Professor Minerva McGonagall, as the woman addressed herself, was the Deputy Headmistress and Transfiguration instructor at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, the most prestigious academy of magical learning in all of Great Britain. She explained—quite patiently—that yes, magic was real, no, she wasn't in fact a madwoman, and yes, she'd love to perform an example for the Grangers. As they sat in the lounge, Professor McGonagall Charmed the tea to pour itself, had the Hummel figurines on the mantel break out into dance, and changed a vase into a chicken all with a flick of the thin stick she called a _wand_.

Hermione couldn't believe her eyes.

The professor asked, "Miss Granger, has anything odd ever happened to you? Have you ever done something or seen something you couldn't explain?"

Hermione wanted to say, "Of course not, everything that occurs has a perfectly rational explanation—," but she didn't. Instead, she sat picking at the crumpet her mother had given her and thought on the question, returning to those curious incidents in her past her logical mind had assumed explanations for. Sometimes she would reach for a second book while reading and find it in her hands when it _should_ have been across the room. She very desperately didn't want to get her homework wet while dashing from the car to the classroom once, and she alone out of all the students arrived dry.

"Yes," she told Professor McGonagall, eyes darting between her parents and the witch. "A few times, ma'am."

"Sometimes," McGonagall explained. "Witches and wizards are born to parents who aren't magical. It's never been explained why exactly this happens, but magic is not always wholly understood. That is why we study it. Some devote their entire lives to the pursuit of answers and only come out with more questions—but Hogwarts is there to help anyone who has need of it."

The professor handed Hermione a letter and she held it close, _H. J. Granger_ gleaming in navy on the thick parchment envelope, a noble crest pressed securely into the purple wax on the back. Hermione tore open the letter. She began to read—and at the end of the list, she looked up at Professor McGonagall with something like wonder in her eyes. _Magic_. _Real magic, and_ she _had it_.

There had to be a catch. There was always a catch to something that sounded so wondrous, and when Hermione said as much, Professor McGonagall's expression creased as she reached into her purse to retrieve a special form.

 _The Muggle-born Protection Act of 1982._

"It is a law implemented by our current Minister for Magic when he came into office," Professor McGonagall informed them, her lips thinning, her voice somber. "In essence, it is a law meant to protect magical children born to non-magical families who can often find themselves in undesirable situations. The gifts of the magical children can sometimes alarm the unprepared." Her nostrils flared. "The Ministry finds that the MPA _protects_ these children against violence and misunderstandings."

The Grangers continued to ask questions and Hermione watched the little furrow between the woman's black brows dig itself deeper and deeper. What Hermione gathered was that Professor McGonagall did _not_ approve of the MPA, which dictated that any Muggle-born who accepted their place at Hogwarts would have to be fostered by an approved Wizarding family, and would only be allowed to visit the non-magical world for the Yule holidays, which amounted to roughly two weeks in the year. If Hermione went to Hogwarts, she would have to leave home. If she went to Hogwarts, she would only see her parents for Christmas until she reached her magical majority at seventeen.

Ten weeks. For the next five years, she would only see her parents—her family—for a grand total of seventy days.

The Grangers didn't often feel out of their respective depths, but listening to Professor McGonagall proved more than they were capable of understanding. Jean and Robert knew their daughter was different—gifted—and that she struggled to fit in as she never struggled to do much else. She'd secured a place at a very fine public school for the upcoming year, but would she only experience more of the same? More _misunderstandings_? More bullying and grief?

Hermione only had to read the letter once to memorize the words, but she read it again, and again, fingers folding down the worn edges of the paper, lips pursed.

She thought about her mum and dad, about Dr. and Dr. Granger, and about the clean-cut lives they led. Being dentists was perfectly acceptable of course, yet remained…tame in the vaster vision of their youthful ambitions. Mum had wanted to be a barrister and perhaps a judge one day. Dad had wanted to go into neurosurgery and the study of the mind.

" _Be the best you can be."_

" _Dear, you can be a bit too much sometimes._ "

Too, too, too.

She loved her parents dearly, just as dearly as they loved her, but their stale ambitions left Hermione discomfited.

"Professor McGonagall," she asked as her parents looked to her and waited for what she would say. "Is there such a thing as being _too_ much of a witch?"

The older witch blinked, lips pursed. "No, I don't believe so, Miss Granger."

Hermione closed her eyes. She took a breath—and chose.

 **xXxXx**

Two days later, she stared up at the great black gates and really, _really_ hoped she hadn't chosen wrong.

A hedge of yew curved along the long gravel drive and the summer air smelled of jasmine, acres and acres of land spilling in every direction without a single indication of civilization. Hermione and the professor had walked along the gravel road—which bore no trace of tire marks, no scuffs, perfect as a ribbon of stone scarring the earth—for quite some time before turning right and coming upon the gates. Beyond the gates loomed the dark stone edifice of a manor illuminated in the afternoon sun.

"The Malfoys fashion themselves to be the pinnacle of Wizarding society," the professor said, her moue of displeasure making a return appearance. "You will be very well taken care of, Miss Granger, as I assured your parents. You will certainly _learn_ quite a bit about what it means to be a witch in the hands of Lucius and Narcissa."

In the interim of the two days Hermione had been given to wrap her mind around everything that had happened and to read the basic information pamphlets, she had learned exactly two things about her new foster family; they were called the Malfoys, and they had been a Wizarding family for as long as history had been recorded.

Professor McGonagall turned to face Hermione and seemed to be thinking very hard on something, her spectacles flashing in the sunlight, which made Hermione feel a bit queasy with apprehension. "If you require anything, you are free to write to me at Hogwarts. And if…." She lowered her voice and paused as if contemplating her words. "And if you feel a situation is urgent enough, I will do my utmost to deliver any messages to your family."

Hermione's brow rose. That was against the law—their law, the Muggle-Protection Act. It prohibited contact with the "Muggle" world outside specified windows of time to mitigate possible exposure.

"Thank you, professor."

"Well, then." Professor McGonagall nodded once, then returned her attention to the gates. She withdrew her wand once again and gave it a flick over herself, reverting her tartan suit into a pair of dark emerald robes, the shoulders quite stiff—not unlike the witch herself. Hermione watched with rapt attention and found herself still unable to fully accept that this all was really happening to her. She had always been a rational girl, convinced of logic and science and medicine—until magic came in and readily tipped her world onto its head.

"On we go, Miss Granger."

Doubling her grip upon her small piece of luggage, Hermione followed Professor McGonagall as the older witch strode forward—and stepped right through the imposing gates as if they weren't there, or simply comprised of something vaporous like smoke or mist. A ticklish sensation overcame Hermione when she did the same and she gawked.

McGonagall hid her smile. "Come along."

The Malfoy Manor was a grand place indeed. Hermione had visited many of the historical houses in non-magical—Muggle, now—England and parts of France with her parents, and the Manor rivaled any of those sites in quality and sheer elegance. What magic was in evidence wasn't gaudy or, well, cliche; no rabbits came popping out of hats, no man was standing by to retrieve an ever-extending line of handkerchiefs from his sleeves. White peacocks strolled through the green lawn, their cries sharp and clear, and stone snakes wound around the cornices.

Hermione wiped nervous sweat from her palms as they walked inside and kept her bushy-head raised held high.

A short creature with green eyes the size of tennis balls, dressed in a ratty pillowcase, greeted them in the foyer, bowing so low its—his?—long nose brushed the marble floor. A chandelier dripping crystals burned with a load of yellow candles overhead, the walls braced with rather terrifying rocaille and _moving_ portraits. Pale, white-haired men and women watched from their gaudy frames.

"Dobby will be taking Miss to his Master's family now," the creature—Dobby—squeaked as those odd eyes landed on McGonagall. He wrung his long-fingered hands. "The Master says to thank the Professor McGonnagolly!"

Professor McGonagall took the hint and gave Dobby a prim nod. Hermione, on the other hand, was still puzzling over the word ' _Master_.' Was Dobby some kind of—servant? Her stomach lurched.

"This is where I leave you, Miss Granger. Remember, if you have need of anything, please write to me at Hogwarts," Professor McGonagall said. She and Hermione shook hands and the latter swallowed her building nerves, telling herself there was no reason to be so nervous, she was a witch and she would learn magic and be the very best she could be at it. The front door opened again without assistance, and Professor McGonagall disappeared in the sunlight.

Dobby spoke and Hermione jumped. "This way, Miss!"

"Yes, I'm coming," she said with a breathless nod. Hermione quickened her pace and followed the bobbing form of Dobby out of the foyer and down an adjoining hall. She continued to try to guess what he was exactly—some kind of hobgoblin? A fairy? A gnome? Something else entirely? And why did he refer to Mr Malfoy as " _Master?"_ It seemed terribly formal to her.

They stopped before a door painted black and framed in the thinnest gilding of gold. Dobby knocked, then proceeded inside.

"The Miss Herme-ninny is here, Master!"

Hermione winced at Dobby's horrible pronunciation of her name and stepped over the threshold. Four people sat in the well-appointed drawing room: a man with the same silvery-blond hair visible in the portraits, a woman of similar cold beauty, a boy Hermione's age identical to the man, and a boy older than her with mousy brown hair and a tired expression. The man, with his pointed profile and silver-tooled robes sitting in the scrolled wing chair by the hearth, looked up at the intrusion and snapped the book he'd been reading closed.

"Ah, yes," he said as he stood. "I thought I heard Minerva's voice. Take her luggage to her room, Dobby." His voice came out hard and sharp as a whip.

The strange creature bobbed in his bow and snatched hold of Hermione suitcase before scuttling out of the room. The door swung shut and Hermione had to lean away lest she be clipped by it.

"Miss Granger. A pleasure to meet you. I am Lucius Malfoy, this is my wife Narcissa Malfoy—." The woman nodded her head in acknowledgment but otherwise remained seated, flipping through what looked to be a moving furniture catalog with disinterest. "My son, Draco—." The pale haired boy sneered. A silent look from Mr Malfoy sent him strolling out of the room without a single word spoken. "And our other Muggle-born ward Jamie Ingham." The tired boy only stared before going back to his own reading.

"Hello. How do you do?" Hermione said, feeling the horrid urge to curtsy. _Ridiculous_.

"Very well. Please, have a seat."

He gestured to an empty chair with a lazy flourish; the Malfoys seemed to be quite practiced in expressing that kind of indolent, well-mannered grace, as if nothing at all mattered, their eyes remarkably distant when they looked at her. Hermione told herself she was being ridiculous again. The Malfoys had been nothing but cordial so far, and it was kind of them to open their home to her and other Muggle-borns like Jaime.

Hermione sat. The Malfoys watched her like fat, glistening spiders wondering if a fluttering moth would land in their web or not. Mr Malfoy smirked as he returned to his own chair and Hermione glanced at the cane leaning against its padded arm. The head was in the shape of a silver snake.

"You must have done exceptionally well at your at Muggle school for the Ministry to place you in our home." The word " _Muggle_ " came out oddly among the other posh syllables, spat with his tongue lingering on the alveolar ending. Hermione shifted under his attention.

"Yes, I—I was the best in my class. I even won a scholarship to Cheltenham."

"And now you've discovered you're a witch. How _exciting_." His tone suggested it wasn't very exciting at all. Mr Malfoy rested his pale hand atop his cane, withdrawing a wand from the top of it when the hand lifted again. He flicked the dark wand toward one of the towering bookshelves flanking the enormous hearth and several volumes jerked themselves free. "You will come to find, Miss Granger, that while the House of Malfoy may not be the _oldest_ pure-blood family in Britain, it is surely one of the most distinguished. You are very fortunate to have been placed with us. You will receive the best money can buy while you remain here—but I must _insist_ your studies remain exemplary. Your marks and your manners reflect directly upon my family name and I will _not_ see it sullied."

"Of—of course, Mr Malfoy," Hermione stuttered, surprised at the forcefulness of his statement. She had about a million questions buzzing inside her skull—but something of this dark and ancient place, of the man before her, forbid such flippancy. If she wished ask something, she had best make sure it was a _very_ good question. "What would happen if my marks fell?"

His lip curled. "You would be placed with another family."

"I see." Hermione's eyes flickered toward Jamie and lingered on the fatigue written in his countenance. "I will do my very best, Mr Malfoy."

The books he'd summoned came soaring toward her. Hermione caught one on instinct and the others stacked themselves on top of it until she held several tomes on her lap, feeling more assured now under the weight of so much knowledge. Some of the titles read _Wizarding Traditions of the Twentieth Century_ , _Noble Houses of the Current Era_ , _A Beginner's Compendium on the Magical Arts, A History of Magic,_ and _Manners for the Modern Witch_. A few didn't sound even remotely interesting to Hermione, yet she knew she would read them anyway.

"I am lending you these volumes from the Malfoy library. I expect them to be returned in the same condition."

"Of course," Hermione replied. It seemed to be the only thing the Malfoy patriarch wanted to hear and Hermione would oblige him if it meant having access to such a trove of written word. She tentatively touched the binding on one text, fingertips skirting along the well-worn paper as something like electricity sparked under her skin. If they continued to be so generous with their books, Hermione didn't much care that the Mafloys didn't appear to be a _warm_ family. She had her own family at home and didn't need a second.

 _I'll make my parents proud_ , she thought. _And I'll become the best witch there is_.

Mr Malfoy inclined his blond head. His silver eyes gleamed. "Very good, Miss Granger. If you're ready, your education on the Wizarding world begins _now_."

 **A/N: In my head-canon, the Quill of Acceptance, which wrote all the magical children in the Book of Admissions at Hogwarts, also wrote out the acceptance letters. For children with magical parents (like Harriet and Elara) it wrote in green ink, while for Muggle-borns (like Hermione), it wrote in blue. This was how the professors knew who needed a home visit, and why neither Harriet nor Elara received one.**

 **I also believe you wouldn't get your letter around your eleventh birthday; rather, you received it in the summer before you were meant to attend. Otherwise professors would have been doing home visits during the school year and students like Hermione, born in September but after the admission date, would have had an entire** _ **year**_ **to prepare over the other students.**

 **The MPA and its implications get explored a lot more later on.**

 **Anyway, hope you're enjoying the story!**

 _ **Thanks to guest reviewer for correcting Hermione's school.**_


	7. find more than treasure here

_**vii. find more than treasure here**_

Harriet was beginning to think she might just be losing her mind. She was, after all, chasing her own shadow through downtown London.

She had followed Set to a bus station in Little Whinging, and from there she had taken a bus all the way to the city, earning many speculative glances from the driver and those passengers who climbed aboard. They looked at the scruffy girl in her over-sized clothes with her unbrushed hair covering her bruised neck and wondered where she was going and if they should perhaps call the authorities. Fortunately for Harriet she reached her stop before anyone could think to detain her.

The sun had well risen and the weather grew warm, muggy, Harriet's mouth dry and her bladder full and her stomach empty. She trailed Set down one street and then another, moving along as fast as she dared, careful to avoid any more attention and the occasional police officer she spotted on the prowl. Harriet found herself eventually toddling down Charing Cross Road, which seemed quite the busy thoroughfare with numerous shops and venues dotted along the avenue. She collided with several pairs of legs as she chased Set.

Suddenly he veered to the left—right across the threshold of a pub Harriet hadn't seen at first. Blinking, she swiped her sweaty fringe out of her eyes as she peered up at the swinging sign that depicted a great pot with a crack in its basin. The letters read " _The Leaky Cauldron_."

"Oh, excellent," Harriet whispered, tired from a poor night of rest and really in desperate need of the loo. She stepped inside and almost swooned at the pleasant rush of cold air coming over her before immediately darting toward a little corridor off to the side, ignoring Set and any of the inner patrons. She found the water-closet and darted through the door.

Once her business was finished and her hands washed, Harriet stepped out of the loo and spared the pub a better look over. Shadows clung about the corners and in the rickety rafters, a mixture of voices and clinking cutlery reaching her ears from the main room, where she'd glimpsed a long bar and a cluttered motley of mismatched tables. On the wall right across from the loo hung a painting of a cauldron, and as Harriet watched, ingredients hopped off shelves and poured themselves into the bubbling stew, changing the liquid in a never-ending rainbow of color.

Her jaw about hit the floor as she lifted a finger to prod the canvas. The ladle took an idle swat at her hand, not that she could feel it. "Utterly mental," she whispered. "I've gone round the bend."

It was _magic_ —bloody magic, plain as you please, right smack in Harriet's face, hanging in an empty hall and all she had to do was stroll in off the street to see it. Like it was nothing. Like this rather ugly painting hadn't just rocked Harriet's small, uncomfortable world.

 _It's real, isn't it? Really, really, real_.

A sudden poke in her ribs turned Harriet's head, and she saw Set flit against the wall behind her, rippling in the weak light thrown by the gas lamps as he pointed toward the bar.

She did as Set directed, having no reason to distrust her shadow, not after he'd taken her this far already.

Behind the counter, the wizened barman with his bushy brows and lined face chatted with a wispy, gray-haired woman dressed in purple robes and a pinstriped skirt. Most everyone in the establishment wore similar robes, some subtle, some outlandish, one man with blond hair and big, pearly teeth dressed all in gold with a group of woman hovering about his table, causing quite a fuss. Some wore clothes that looked normal under their longer robes, if a bit old-fashioned—until closer inspection revealed differences in cut and style than Harriet was used to. One woman's blouse had blooming flowers on it that shed and regrew their peachy petals over and over again.

"Hullo there, lass. How can I help ya?"

Startled, Harriet tore her eyes away the many strange sights around her and instead looked up at the barman. "Oh, er." Harriet had no idea what to say or why Set had led her here, besides the fact that the establishment oozed magic and mystique. "Um, could I get something to drink…?" She took the crumpled bills from her pocket and wrinkled her nose at the damp texture. _Sweat. Gross_.

"No Muggle money here, lass," the barman said as he spied the notes in Harriet's hands. _Muggle?_ "You'll need to go on to Gringotts first. You Muggle-born? Where's yer guardian?"

Harriet wondered why he skipped straight to _guardian_ rather than parent. Did she have some sort of cosmic sign over her head that said ' _orphan_ '? "Er—they sent me on my own."

The barman's brow furrowed and he seemed on the brink of saying something, perhaps something against her supposed guardians or perhaps in recrimination of Harriet herself, but he thought better of it. The gray-haired witch who'd been listening to their exchange finished her drink—some kind of juice if Harriet wasn't mistaken, the remnants of an English breakfast on the plate before her—and stood. "I can show the girl on up to Gringotts, Tom," she offered, giving Harriet a small smile. "My name is Mafalda Hopkirk, Miss…?"

"Harriet," she said, pausing. "Well, Potter. Harriet Potter."

"It's very nice to meet you, Miss Potter. Let's be off then, shall we?"

Harriet nodded, not knowing what else to say, though she was leery of going somewhere with a stranger. That leery feeling only grew when she followed the woman—the witch—into a grubby back alley adjoined to the rear of the pub, and Harriet almost darted back inside and away from Mafalda. She didn't consider herself a coward, but Harriet had very little luck with adults in the past and had even less trust for strangers. The witch took out a stick from the inner folds of her long, rippling cloak and gave the bricks on the wall a good sharp tap.

A crack resounded through the air. Harry watched, dumbfounded, as the bricks began to shift on their own accord, peeling like the skin of an orange, curling at the edges until a new pathway was plainly visible. The roof of the warehouse above the wall remained—and yet there was an _alley_ in front of Harriet, not the rear of a warehouse; an alley full of people dressed in funny clothes carrying funny things and saying funny words.

There, a name was written on an arch: _Diagon Alley_.

"Come along, then, Miss Potter. I need to get to the Ministry yet this morning."

Harriet urged her wobbly legs forward despite the sudden tingling in her limbs and hands. Mafalda tucked her stick into her cloak with a curious look in Harriet's direction, then led the way up the street away from the grubby alley opening. Harriet, for her part, did her best not to gawk and shriek and generally make a nuisance of herself, staring at every little thing she could. There was a man selling bits of _dragon_ liver, and that vendor there had little cooling charms you clipped to the front of your robes, guaranteed to keep you cool and fresh the rest of the day! Harriet brushed the side of a lumpy witch and her cloak left out a chorus of bird calls.

"Is this your first time to the Alley?"

Harriet started when Mafalda addressed her. The witch had already moved off several paces and Harriet blushed in her rush to catch up. Set had returned to her shadow for now, leaving Harriet to her own devices. "Er, yeah." She scratched her head and tried to think of a plausible reason for her being there by herself. While the temptation to ask questions—or to simply beg for help—was great, Harriet knew she'd most likely end up in a police station, or right back with the Dursleys if she wasn't careful. She refused to return there. "My folks had to work and, uh, sent me on my own."

Malfalda's brow furrowed. Harriet knew there must be some glaring inconsistencies in her story, so she shrugged off any of the witch's follow up questions and hurried her on to their destination. _Gringotts_ , the barman Tom had said. Harriet guessed it was a bank of some kind, and that she'd have to exchange her stolen pounds there for whatever money the magical people used. Hopefully she had enough to buy all the odds and ends listed on her charred letter.

"That's Gringotts there, Miss Potter," Malfalda said when they reached the alley's end. A towering building of white stone sat at a fork in the path, Diagon Alley continuing to the left, a sign stating the right to be Empiric Alley. The name " _Gringotts_ " scrolled across the bank's stone face, a set of sweeping steps leading up into a marble antechamber. It _looked_ like the kind of place someone would want to store their money—or spend it, whatever their preference. It also looked like the kind of place that would throw a scruffy urchin like Harriet right out on her ear.

"Ah—thanks," Harriet said, staring up at the waiting doors and the thick columns like the arching teeth of a wolf.

"There's access to the Ministry for Magic down Empiric Alley, if you didn't know," Malfalda said with a telling nod in that direction. "The Department of Welfare and Muggle-born Placement could provide…help, if one were to ask. Discreetly, of course."

Harriet didn't know exactly what the witch spoke of, but she was bright enough to recognize the words _Ministry_ and _Department of Welfare_. No, if Harriet went toddling about a government building, she'd end up with the Dursleys again, in her cupboard, before she could blink. What if they took her letter away? What if they told her it had all been a mistake, that Harriet was just weird, that she didn't belong anywhere at all?

"That's okay, Ms Hopkirk. Thank you for showing me the way."

Resigned, Malfalda nodded. "I'll be off, then. Good day."

"Bye."

Harriet started up the steps and the gray-haired witch went her own way, hurrying along the right fork in the road. Many people came and went from the bank, some dressed as flashy as that smiling wizard in the pub, some more demure in shades of black and brown and gray. One wizard in a purple turban came dashing down the steps in a terrible rush, his face stricken. A man with long silvery hair and a black cane brushed by Harriet and sneered as if he'd touched something disgusting.

 _Well I could do with a shower._

Harriet managed to climb halfway up the steps before she caught sight of who—or what—guarded the doors and froze.

 _What the bloody hell is that?_

"That" being a creature with very long fingers and feet, though the rest of it—him—was comparatively small. A bald pate gleamed on the top of his domed head and pointed teeth showed through his thin, parted lips, a crest of some kind positioned on the center of his black vest. A passing witch counting gold coins in the palm of her hand muttered, "Bleedin' goblins and rubbish exchange rates—."

 _Goblins_? Harriet marveled, watching the creature watch the customers come and go. _Goblins_ were real now too?

A sudden jab in the ribs brought her attention down. Seth, distorted by the angle of the steps, jabbed a finger toward the waiting doors.

"Yes, alright," Harriet whispered, ascending the rest of the way into the foyer's cool shadow. Harriet edged around the goblin, half expecting him to bar her entree and shoo her away, but the goblin only leered, motioning for Harriet to stop blocking the entrance with her horrid spy theatrics. She quickly apologized to the wizard she'd bumped into and rushed inside.

Two high counters dominated the inner chamber, stretching from one end to the other, behind which clustered more of the pale, long-fingered goblins dressed in black suits with gold fobs and brooches and pins. One was laying rubies the size of Harriet's head on the side of a scale, another arguing with a well-dressed witch over a set of fine dishes, a third stacking gold bars on a hovering cart that left on its own once filled. Some humans in uniforms similar to the one the goblin outside wore marched the chamber and exchanged brief words with one another.

Harriet puffed out her cheeks, overwhelmed, then exhaled. _Here goes nothing_.

She approached a goblin who appeared to be both unoccupied and a teller. He made idle scribbles in the ledger before him with a feathered quill tucked into his strange hand. "E-excuse me? Err—Sir?"

The goblin continued to write until he reached a stopping point, when he lowered the quill and leaned forward to leer over the edge of the counter with an unfriendly sneer. "Name?"

"Uh," came Harriet's initial—and rather intelligent—response. "I mean, Harriet Potter. My name, that is. Harriet Potter," she rambled.

He scribbled something on the ledger again and flipped a page. He sniffed. "And does Miss Potter want to make a withdrawal from her vaults today?"

"My what now?"

Harriet swallowed as the goblin leaned forward again, a decidedly displeased gleam in his beady eyes. "Do you wish to access your vaults or not?"

"I don't have any vaults."

"Our records show different."

Then the goblin snapped his fingers, and Harriet jumped when the ledger he'd been writing in jerked itself about and dropped roughly two feet off the edge of the counter to come to her eye-level. Harriet gawked as letters unfurled themselves across the opened page, stark and black against the yellow sheen of bound parchment.

 _N. House Potter Estate, entailed, nontransferable._

 _Beneficiary: Harriet Dorea Potter, 31 Oct 1981._

The letters continued in a looping script of puzzling legal nonsense and Harriet struggled to recognize even half of the jargon. A few columns of numbers and names spilled themselves over the ledger when the page flipped itself, and though Harriet still couldn't make heads or tails of the figures, she did see that the names had "Potter" for a surname. She recognized the one listed above her own moniker, _James Fleamont Potter_ , as her father—though she hadn't know his middle name was _Fleamont_. How unfortunate.

Her dad must have been a wizard, then. Was her mum a witch? Aunt Petunia had shouted " _That's what magic does to people_!" when she'd rowed with Harriet about her parents leaving her with the Dursleys. Was that how the Potters had actually died? Harriet didn't see any bloody cars out and about on Diagon Alley. Did wizards and witches even _use_ cars? Had magic killed her parents?

 _I'm going to find out,_ Harriet told herself as the ledger snapped shut an inch from her nose and rose into the goblin's possession. _Right after I find out about this vault business. How did he even know who I am? It's not like Potter's an uncommon name_.

"Does Miss Potter wish to inspect her vaults?" the goblin asked again in a noticeably more tetchy tone.

Harriet fussed with the hem of her ugly secondhand shirt and nodded.

"Does Miss Potter have her _key_?"

"No," Harriet replied, heart sinking. "I was never given a key." He should know that, of course, considering she obviously didn't know about the blasted vaults in the first place. Maybe there had been a mistake. She didn't think the Dursleys had ever been given a key, either, since they would've cleared out any money her parents left Harriet—and maybe they already _had_. Maybe these vaults or boxes or whatever had already been sucked dry by Harriet's relatives.

The goblin let out a put upon sigh. "You will need to give a sample of blood before a key can be reissued and then you will be escorted to your vault by a goblin associate. Is this agreeable?"

"Yes?"

In short order, one of the human employees came over and dropped a stool down on the floor with a kindly smile toward Harriet as he helped her up. Harriet burned under the curious attention of the other bank goers turning to look at the raggedy little girl, and being closer to the goblin did _not_ make her less nervous. He leered as if he'd love to do nothing more than shove Harriet backwards off that stool, but he went on with his task. Her finger was pricked, a droplet sampled, and suddenly Harriet was being hustled off down a side corridor with a gleaming golden key pressed into her grubby palm.

A door opened onto what looked like a dusty mineshaft. The goblin assisting Harriet now—Griphook—led Harriet toward a waiting cart that sat upon a pair of thick iron rails. The rails plunged off into the dark. Griphook held the only light, a battered old lantern with a wavering flame.

Harriet gulped as she took a seat and the goblin jumped into the front. _Are these vaults underground?_

"Potter trust vault. Six hundred eighty-seven."

"Six hundred eighty—?"

The remainder of Harriet's question was cut off with a yelp when Griphook thrust the lever holding the cart in place forward and they went rocketing into motion. She clutched the cart's metal sides with white-knuckled fists as they plummeted down one slope and then careened through another, the cold air whipping past, turning Harriet's already frightful hair into a right mess, her small backside lifting off the padded seat when the rails abruptly swerved again. Griphook grinned nastily.

Several minutes later, the cart came to a lurching stop and Harriet—dizzy but a bit enthralled by the journey—stumbled out after Griphook. "Six hundred eighty-seven," the goblin said, jabbing a long finger at the vault in question. Harriet had been expecting something more along the lines of a safety deposit box, not an actual, honest to goodness _vault_. "Six hundred eighty-eight—." He pointed instead at the larger metal door across the way. It was partially obscured by a glittering stalagmite—or was that a stalactite? "Will be accessible at your majority."

"Okay," Harriet said, not knowing what one _should_ say to a goblin. Instead, she passed the key over to him and allowed Griphook to get on with opening the vault up.

Green smoke hissed out through the crack, torches burst into life, and Harriet almost had a heart attack.

 _Gold_.

It glimmered in every corner, climbed the walls and spilled across the polished floor— _gold._ She had never seen so much of it before in her life, not in books or pictures or even on the telly when the Dursleys let her watch commercials after the dishes were washed and her chores completed. The vault itself seemed to emit a brilliant yellow light from how the torches reflected on the accrued wealth, on the tidy mountains of solid gold bars, on the buckets of coins, the roped coils of white pearls and silver chains and the gilt frames with _moving_ people on the canvases. There were trunks stacked to the ceiling and long curtains of silk fabric and stacks upon stacks of great fat books. Trembling, she bent down to pick up a coin that had fallen near the vault door.

Poor orphan Harriet, who had a pocketful of sweaty, stolen notes, who had never eaten a full meal before, who had lived under the stairs and now lived nowhere at all, burst into tears.

Griphook despaired.


	8. wand of elder

_**viii. wand of elder**_

When the hysterical tears ran dry, Harriet wiped her eyes—and her nose—and took a breath.

She knew she wasn't terribly clever; rather, she was intelligent but lacked that spark inherent to those of _true_ cleverness, that intuitive sixth sense that allowed those more brilliant than her to assimilate their environment and find information with ease. Sometimes Harriet had to be told things twice, and sometimes she didn't have to be told at all. What a life with the Dursleys had taught young Harriet was that one got by on a lack of cleverness by using cunning, and by taking stock of their situation while they could.

The goblins, she guessed from their behavior, didn't much like witches and wizards, so she asked them questions, confident they wouldn't send her off to that welfare office Mafalda had mentioned because they simply didn't want to deal with the hassle. Griphook grumbled and grunted and sneered while he spoke, but a coin or two placed in his hand loosened the goblin's tongue well enough.

He told Harriet that the gold coins were Galleons and the silver were Sickles and the bronze were Knuts. He wasn't sure how the Potters had died but knew that James Potter, despite his vast fortune, had been an Auror—which was a bit like a Muggle policeman—so Griphook assumed he and his wife Lily must have been offed during the war. When Harriet asked about the war, he told her she'd best go to Flourish and Blotts and buy a bloody history book because he didn't have all day to tell stories to nasty little wizarding brats.

Harriet was apparently the head of the "Noble House of Potter," which wasn't as great as being in a "Most Noble House" or in a "Noble and Ancient House" or even a "Noble and Most Ancient House." When Harriet asked if there was such thing as a "Most Noble and Most Ancient House," Griphook told her not to be ridiculous. What the designation boiled down to, she understood, was that she had a seat on the Wizengamot, which was a bit like a magic conclave that Wizarding families applied to so they could sit in on very boring political meetings about laws and whatnot and have their voices heard. It cost two hundred Galleons per annum to retain a House's seat, and one of Harriet's ancestors had apparently paid the fine up through the next one hundred and fourteen years.

Sounded barmy to Harriet, but there it was.

The Potters had an estate—the Stinchcombe House—which was a modest manor out in the Gloucestershire countryside. It was "entailed," which meant the house belong to Harriet's family and not really to Harriet herself, and she had absolutely no access to it because it was part of the fortune secured and locked away in Vault Six Hundred and Eighty-Eight. Vault Six Hundred and Eight-Seven was a trust fund set aside for the Potter heirs for their personal use, kept separate from the main estate in case something catastrophic were to happen to the family's fortune. Griphook had a nasty grin on again when he told Harriet about all the Wizarding families who had bankrupted themselves in the past.

While goblins didn't seem very nice at all, they did prove informative, and when plied with gold, Griphook was quick enough to mention useful things to Harriet. He pointed out a spelled trunk with an extension Charm that was most likely illegal now and would be excellent for Harriet's use at Hogwarts. The goblin noted her keen interest in the Stinchcombe House and commented that the Leaky Cauldron could take on longterm boarders if necessary. He told her that if she wished to be smarter than the average stupid witch or wizard she needed to buy more books than were on her school list, and if she wanted anyone to take her seriously, it didn't matter if she had a bag filled with Galleons, she needed to go to Twilfitt and Tattings and get some bloody better clothes.

So, once Harriet loaded a purse with coin and took hold of her family trunk, she finally trundled out of Gringotts into the hot afternoon sun and took a left upon the alley to venture down the Southside. She ambled along with the strange crowd, feeling loads more confident now that she had real Wizarding money and knew, without a doubt, that she _was_ a witch, her eyes taking in all the peculiar sights with hungry attention. Newspapers at a stand outside a building called the Daily Prophet read themselves aloud to passersby. A pair of twin red-heads came out of Gambol and Japes with wide grins. Shady characters lurked near an arch proclaimed the entrance to "Knockturn Alley" and Harriet kept well away from there.

Harriet paused at the post office to send off her acceptance notice to Hogwarts, then entered Twilfitt and Tattings and was almost immediately set upon by a snooty witch who didn't seem to believe Harriet was, in fact, a paying customer. Logically Harriet knew Griphook had been correct in his assumption that no one would take her seriously when she dressed like a beaten rag doll, but it was still annoying to be judged solely based off her appearance. The witch eventually changed her tune—after much cajoling and purse rattling—and Harriet walked out of the shop an hour later with a new wardrobe. She wore an emerald sun dress that had a neckline high enough to hide most of her scar, and a Charm in the hem meant to prevent it from tearing or becoming dirty.

Harriet had never owned anything new before, let alone something so pretty.

Magic oozed through the alley and Harriet found herself quickly becoming enamored with it. It was such a _marvel_ ; every little thing could be accomplished with a spell or a Charm or a Hex, witches and wizards whipping out sticks—or _wands_ , as she learned they were called—to shrink their bags or levitate them, changing their cloaks from blue to green to red, popping in and out of existence with a quick turn of their heels, or jabbering on as they carried cauldrons and books and owls and moving papers. Harriet felt like she was in a dream and she never wished to wake from it.

After Twilfitt and Tattings she returned to the Northside of Diagon to find Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions, where she would have to buy her uniforms for school, according to the snooty witch at Twilfitt. Harriet found the shop and poked her head inside. A small bell chimed.

"Hogwarts, dear?" asked an older witch with red cheeks and curly hair. She was much nicer than the other witch Harriet had met, and she smiled when Harriet quickly nodded, then led her farther into the shop where two other students were already being fitted for their own robes. Harriet was ushered onto a stool next to a bushy-haired girl about Harriet's age while a pale, drawling boy on the girl's other side continued to drone.

"—honestly, Granger, how you expect to _manage_ at all when you can't even recognize which of the houses is _greatest_ —."

The girl, Granger, flushed an irritated color and, when she spoke, did so in a rush of very precisely enunciated words. "None of the houses are greater than any of the others," she insisted. "The book states clearly that each has it failings and its accomplishments. Slytherin is _not_ the best, nor is Gryffindor, or Ravenclaw, or Hufflepuff."

"Don't let father hear you saying that. He might chuck you back to the Muggles," the boy snorted. He seemed to realize someone else had appeared, because he looked past Granger to Harriet and said, "Well? What do you think?"

Harriet blinked as a shop assistant jerked a standard black robe over her head and started in on the magic pins. "What?"

"Which house do you think is best?" he demanded.

Harriet hadn't the faintest clue what he was asking, so she looked to the other girl for help. "Err, I think you're right," she said. The boy was being rather rude, and Harriet decided it was best to give the other girl some support. _What houses is he going on about? Slithered in? Huffle buff?_

The boy scoffed. "You haven't a clue what I'm talking about, do you?" When Harriet didn't respond, he straightened himself and stared into the mirror before him with an unpleasant scowl. "Bloody Mudbloods everywhere nowadays…."

"Draco!"

"Do shut up, Granger. Try to show _some_ dignity."

Granger turned her shoulder to the boy—Draco—and ignored him. "I'm Hermione Granger," she said to Harriet, sticking out her hand. "I'm a Muggle-born, too. You are going to Hogwarts, right?"

"Right," Harriet replied as she shook Hermione's hand, her brow furrowed. She didn't think she was a—what did she call it? Muggle-born? Griphook had said "Muggles" were the non-magical people out in regular London, and Harriet's dad had been a wizard, and she was fairly certain her mother had been a witch—or maybe not, considering Aunt Petunia was about as mundane as a person could be. Mundane as cheese. Maybe Harriet was Muggle-born. There was so much she didn't know. "I'm Harriet."

"Are you excited to go to Hogwarts?" Hermione asked, going on before Harriet could open her mouth. "I personally can't _wait_. Magic is so very fascinating. You really should think about getting _Hogwarts: A History_ before you go. It has all kinds of information about the Houses and all the classes that have been taught at the castle over the centuries and the separate modifications it's gone through. Draco insists that Slytherin is the greatest, but _I_ think it has more to do with your personal values and qualities. You can't truly think to rate a House based on the virtues of ambition or loyalty or wisdom— _."_

"Take a breath, Granger. For Merlin's sake."

Unfortunately at that moment Harriet was brought down off the stool, her robes finished, and so she waved a quick goodbye to Hermione and Draco, feeling a bit irked she hadn't been able to have a decent conversation with either. She loaded her purchases into the top drawer of her trunk, careful not to drop anything into the cavernous lower drawer, then moved on to her next stop.

Harriet purchased a pewter cauldron at Potage's Cauldron Shop, picked up a standard potions kit at the rather smelly Apothecary, ogled the fancy flying brooms at Quality Quidditch Supplies, then stepped into Flourish and Blotts. She remembered Griphook's advice and selected several other books aside from the ones on her school letter, including one on goblin wars, one about magical creatures, another containing a multitude of ways to curse your enemies and hex your friends, and _Hogwarts: A History_. In the end she was glad she had taken the trunk along, as it seemed to be Charmed almost weightless as well as big and roomy.

She was on her way back to the other end of the alley when Set jabbed her in the ribs again, this time gesturing at a brightly lit sweet shop stationed near Gringotts. Only then did Harriet realize how very hungry and thirsty she was, her head dizzy and her feet aching from walking on the hard cobblestones, so she stopped at Florean Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlour for a blueberry and mint flavored treat, as well as a tall glass of something called "pumpkin juice." Harriet wasn't sure if she liked the drink, but she assumed it would grow on her.

She came at last to the shop she'd been most looking forward to: Ollivanders. It didn't look like much on the outside. The sign proclaiming that they'd been in business since 382 BC was faded and peeling, the gold letters of the name crinkled at the edges, and the display window held only a single stick—wand—on a faded purple cushion. From all the conversations she'd overheard snippets of, Harriet knew it was the very best place in all of Britain to buy one's magic wand—and Harriet was ecstatic to purchase her own.

She'd never been to a church before, but she rather imagined it was a lot like stepping into Ollivanders; a hush pervaded the tiny shop, a palpable sanctity that clung to the place as surely as the thick layer of dust. Long, slender boxes filled the shelves from floor to ceiling with very little room to spare. There was a counter with an ancient register sat atop it and one spindly chair with the stuffing poking out the sides of the cushioned seat. No one was in sight.

Set flickered and curled about Harriet's feet, waiting.

"Hello?" Harriet called, setting her trunk down by the chair. "Is anyone here? I need to buy a, er, magic wand?"

"Hello," echoed a man's voice. Harriet let out a startled swear when the old man slipped quietly from the shadows, his wide, pale eyes watching her with all the eerie uncanniness of two uncovered moons. His gray hair was wispy and wild about his head. "Ah…Harriet Potter."

Harriet stared as the elderly wizard came slowly forward, gradual as creeping mist, tingles prickling along her spine. "H-how do y'know my name?"

The wizard smiled. "You've your mother's eyes," he said. "And your father's poor hair, I'm afraid. Ten and a quarter, Lily was. Willow, excellent for Charms. And James…eleven inches, Mahogany. Pliable. Perfect for Transfiguration. I remember every wand I've ever sold, Miss Potter, though I don't always know where they end up."

Harriet failed to find her voice, overwhelmed as she was by the sudden jolt to her system. Really, she liked to think she didn't normally lack control over her emotions, but the day had been quite long. Harriet had seen many marvelous things, and she'd also learned a high volume of stressful information. She'd never seen a picture of her parents. She had no idea that she mirrored Lily's eyes or James' hair.

"I sold the wand that did that as well," the wizard murmured as his fingertips grazed the side of Harriet's neck over the thin veins of scarring that curled about her throat. Harriet jolted out of her stupor. "Thirteen and half inches, yew. A powerful combination. Very powerful indeed." The briefest flicker of contrition passed through those pale eyes. "Perhaps, in hindsight, I should have known better. Making a wand like that. Power does so often call to the Dark—or perhaps the Dark calls to power? Who can say?"

"You—you said a wand made my scar?" Harriet asked, fidgeting with her glasses.

"Of course. Very distinct, curse scars. I am, of course, in the minority that believes He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named cursed you directly, but fools will believe what they want to believe."

 _He who what—?_

Harriet's mouth was dry. Her head was spinning again. "I was told I got it in the car accident that killed my parents."

"Car?" the wizard frowned. "For certain you received the scar when Mrs and Mr Potter died; He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named could have hardly cursed you without going through your parents first." He seemed to realize he'd said something insensitive, because the wizard covered his mouth and urged a swaying Harriet to have a seat on the spindly chair. He rushed on before Harriet could ask questions. "Ah, well—where are my manners? I'm Garrick Ollivander, Miss Potter, and it is very nice to meet you. Now, let's see about getting you a wand, shall we?"

Harriet let him get on with it while she tried to gather her wits. _Blown up_ , Aunt Petunia had said. _That's what magic does to people!_

 _The Department of Magical Law Enforcement still deposits payments out of Potter's pension benefit. He was probably an Auror met a sticky end in the war._

 _He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named could have hardly cursed you without going through your parents first._

Someone…someone had _killed_ Harriet's family. James and Lily must have been mur—.

"Oh dear, not that one."

Harriet looked about and had a chance to glimpse the wand that had been shoved into her hand before Ollivander jerked it away. Another replaced it, then another, and another. On and on Ollivander went to the teetering shelves only to return with more wands that he summarily rejected. Harriet tried to reclaim the joy of the moment, and yet her excitement remained tame in the light of this newest revelation. Perhaps it should've been obvious after all the small hints and outright claims she'd heard so far, and perhaps Harriet had ignored the hints, had buried her head in the proverbial sand to escape the terrible, terrible news. Perhaps she hadn't wanted to know.

"Yes, _this_ one," Ollivander said as he returned once more, this time only holding a single battered box in his pale hands. "I have a very good feeling about _this_ one. A very good feeling. Holly, eleven inches, nice and supple. Go on, Miss Potter. Give it a flick."

Harriet lifted the wand—and immediately felt a ticklish kind of warmth spread beneath her skin, pushing aside the wounded feel of her saddened heart. Smiling, she did as Ollivander suggested and gave the wand a swish, gasping when a burst of silver sparks poured from the wand's tip. _Magic_. Harriet had done magic, easy as you please.

"Excellent!" Ollivander cheered, clapping. "A wonderful bond, Miss Potter. Curious, though, very curious."

"How so?" she asked as she tucked the wand back into the box and Ollivander took it toward the register. He opened his mouth to answer, then came to an abrupt halt, looking down upon short Harriet with her bruised neck and thin face and tired eyes. He turned the box, thumbs hooked along the lid's edge, and simpered.

"Nothing at all, Miss Potter. Nothing at all. That will be seven Galleons, and…here."

He reached below the register to a shelf that held a collection of weathered tomes coated in the same saintly dust as the rest of the shop. Ollivander withdrew one of the books and handed it to Harriet along with her wand when she extracted the seven coins from her purse.

" _The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts_ ," she read aloud, puzzled. "What's this for?"

"A small gift. You will find it…informative." Ollivander smiled again, just the slightest twitch of the mouth. "I will expect great things from you. Great things indeed. Good luck, Miss Potter."

Harriet was shooed from the shop then, her trunk laden with magical purchases trailing at her heels, a fat book under one skinny arm and a wand box in the hand of the other. Few witches or wizards wandered this far end of the alley, and Harriet wagered it was because buying a wand wasn't an everyday occurrence for most. The sun was dipping low along the crooked roofs belonging to Diagon Alley's many shops, and Harriet decided she had best return to the Leaky Cauldron and see about that extended boarding Griphook mentioned. Harriet wasn't sure how she'd manage without an adult.

She made to stop and tuck her new things away—when her wand was jerked from her hand.

"Hey—!"

Harriet's breath left her in a gasp when she saw Set—more corporeal than she had ever seen him before—crack the box between his spidery hands and retrieve her wand from the plush velvet. The stick of holly spun between fingers comprised of shadow and air as the box fell to the cobblestones, forgotten, and the wand turned in ever quickening circles.

"What are you _doing_?!"

The wood lightened until it was as pale as ash, the shape changing, new grooves forming where Set's tapered fingers traced funny designs. The tip lengthened beyond the original eleven inches. Set flicked the wand into the air and, on instinct, Harriet reached out to catch it. The wand slapped into her palm as if summoned.

The warmth that answered her touch was not the same; no indeed, the tepid satisfaction became a soaring inferno, and the sadness imparted by learning her parents' fates was incinerated beneath a wave of confidence that thrummed like a heartbeat in Harriet's small hand. It _sung_. For a girl who had never owned anything of her own before that day, Harriet felt uncommonly attached to that wand now. Like it was a part of her arm and she'd sooner lose a hand than let it go.

As Set returned to her shadow, the young Potter girl marveled at how much she _loved_ magic.


	9. where stars dwell

_**ix. where stars dwell**_

When the final letter came, Elara was ready to go.

The benefit of practically being raised in the shadow of a pulpit was the exhausting linguistics preparation that went into teaching jaded orphans how to read and interpret the puzzling language of the bible. The inhabitants of St. Giles' spent an abundance of time with their necks bent over stuffy passages, fighting the urge to yawn, lest they wanted to feel the back of a ruler slap their hands. Elara excelled at her coursework—if only because she loathed being struck or touched. She could recite whole pages of Matthew or Mark or the Epistles without much thought, and when she sat down to write Minerva McGonagall, she had the literary prowess necessary to ask the right questions without receiving the wrong reactions.

She thought her handwriting would have been neater had her wrists not still been aching from Father Phillips' _treatment_.

Elara Black knew how to read Latin and how to sing psalms and how to forge acceptance letters to religious boarding schools on the other side of the country. She knew the right words to say and knew when to be quiet, knew when to keep her eyes down and when to bluff. She wrote questions to _Professor_ McGonagall in the dead of night and let Matron Fitzgerald send an acceptance note to St. Katherine's School for Girls, a note that would go absolutely nowhere at all. Elara walked a thin line between outright deception and truth, letting neither woman know all the answers to the questions they asked, never letting them know just how desperately she wanted to leave that place.

Because Elara had decided to leave. Hogwarts or no, she would not stay at St. Giles' another day.

By stating that her guardians weren't familiar with the area, she managed to convince Professor McGonagall to send a brief series of instructions for where to purchase school supplies and how to access the "Wizarding" world, as it was called. The instructions included many words that were outside Elara's vocabulary—including " _flooing_ " or " _Apparating_ " or " _Muggle_ "—but she understood the basic necessities.

When she asked about tuition, the tone of McGonagall's letters became more suspicious, pondering if something had happened to the Black fortune, if Elara or her guardians were being denied access to the Gringotts vaults, and so Elara quickly demurred until the subject was changed—but the words stayed with her. _Fortune. Gringotts. Vaults._

Had Elara's parents left money for her? Perhaps McGonagall had the wrong Black. It wasn't a terribly uncommon surname, after all.

Or so Elara thought.

She left a week from the end of July. A final letter from McGonagall included possible temporary accommodations she could find in London, and a ticket for the train to school that would depart at exactly eleven o'clock on September first from Platform Nine and Three Quarters, Kings Cross Station. Elara gathered her satchel and her fare for the non-magical train trip into the city. Sister Abigail cooed about how proud she was of Elara, Matron Fitzgerald warned her there'd best be no problems from her at St. Katherine's, and Father Phillips pressed an iron cross on a chain into her palm, saying they would see her when the holidays came.

In a fit of vindictive pique, Elara threw the cross into the bushes once she was left at the station alone.

They would never see her again.

 **xXxXx**

The name Black, she came to know, was not as common as she theorized.

No, Black was the name of traitors, of murderers, and of madmen—and Elara was the daughter of all three.

Her revelation began at the bank Professor McGonagall mentioned in her letters, Gringotts. Elara followed the instructions on how to reach "Diagon Alley" from the "Muggle-side" of London, and though she was suitably flabbergasted by her first _real_ experience with magic, she managed to stagger along the alley's length until she found the goblin-ran bank. She almost collided with a bespectacled girl in rumpled clothes coming out of the foyer dragging a trunk, but once there, the goblins swiped some of Elara's blood—and her life started to unravel at the seams.

She was not the only Black alive. In fact, not only was Elara not the last of her name, she also wasn't in control of the family fortune the professor had told her about. That honor fell to the current head of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, her father Sirius Orion Black—and his proxy, Cygnus Pollux Black the Third.

 _Well,_ she thought, sitting in one of the well-appointed meeting rooms off the main Gringotts' chamber. _The celestial monikers would explain my name, at least_. "Sirius," she asked in a breathless whisper, staring at the goblin—Sledgetongue—across from her. "My father, Sirius, is alive?"

The scrawny goblin bared yellow teeth. "If you can call being incarcerated in the Wizarding prison _alive_."

More letters were written. More owls sent winging off into the summer sky. Elara left to check into a quaint inn on neighboring Horizont Alley called "The Niffler's Nest," which she was assured often boarded Hogwarts students who lived far from London and needed to be closer to the station—though not usually quite so early in the summer. They charged a fee to Hogwarts itself, so she needn't worry about paying for that yet. Elara perched silently on the edge of her mattress, dazed, her satchel resting on the duvet at her side. She stared at the pinstriped wallpaper and told herself again and again that it didn't matter, that it didn't matter if her father was alive because he was in _prison_ , for goodness' sake—.

Elara returned to Gringotts at precisely eleven o'clock. She expected to greet Mr Cygnus Black, her great uncle and proxy head of the family, whom the goblins had written earlier that very morning to arrange a meeting with—only for Elara to confront one of the ugliest creatures she had ever seen when she stepped into the second chamber again.

It was shorter than the goblins, hunched with gangling limbs, a bulbous nose, bloodshot eyes, and great sagging folds of flesh. If Elara were to be honest, it looked as if someone had held the scowling imp over a fire for too long and he'd started to melt like overheated wax. The creature dipped his head in the approximation of a bow after he looked Elara over from head to foot. The white hair sprouting out of his floppy ears shifted with the motion.

"The master sends his regrets for not being able to attend, but poor master is not well. Kreacher is here to take the blood-traitor's daughter to Master Cygnus."

 _Blood-traitor_?

Elara wasn't sure she wanted to go anywhere with such a cantankerous little thing, but she wasn't given much of a choice. Kreacher, as he called himself, reached out a bony arm and took hold of Elara's wrist. She gasped at the resulting sting, and the breath disappeared into the sudden crushing pressure that consumed her. It was like being sucked through a narrow straw at high velocity without access to air, her insides churning, heart pounding—.

As abruptly as it had begun, the pressure abated and Elara landed on her knees, retching.

Kreacher twisted his lined lips, biting back a retort, and gave his fingers a snap. The sick splattered across the floor vanished.

"The blood-traitor's daughter will follow Kreacher."

Elara lifted her head and saw a narrow foyer, a black door with no knob at her back, a dusty corridor before her that led to a stairwell and another shut door. Flocked wallpaper peeled from the walls in curling strips, and Kreacher's little feet left smudged prints on the floorboards and carpet runner. Gas lamps flickered to life, putrescent yellow in color behind emerald glass globes, cobwebs thick as hair caught in the fixtures' curlicues. Kreacher turned to glare. Elara stumbled upright, dazed, and trailed after him.

Another girl might not have followed the pale little thing deeper into the house. Another girl would have been frightened out of her wits by Kreacher, by the decor, by the sudden relocation from one place to another—but Elara had lived for several years frightened of herself, of the Matron, of the Father, and compared to the orphanage, this place wasn't remotely scary. It certainly set her ill at ease, yet the grandeur beneath the grunge remained prevalent, and Elara was sad when she thought of what the house must have looked like in years past.

As they climbed the stairs, Elara could've sworn whispers bloomed at her back, yet a glance over her shoulder showed the landing as bare as it had been when she passed it by. She kept her eyes forward after that.

Kreacher knocked upon a door and opened it with a wave of his gnarled hand. He gestured Elara inside.

Breathing was the first thing she noted; heavy and wet, the pants came at a stilted intervals in the darkened room, little sunlight managing to crawl about the edges of the thick damask curtains on the windows, a fire all but dead in the filthy hearth. The man lay in his nightgown beneath several comforters and blankets with his torso propped up by fine, tasseled pillows, the silver and emerald hangings tied off to the thick posters of the bed. The room smelled of sweat and sick.

"Come closer, then, I'm not contagious."

Embarrassed to realize she'd just been standing on the rug staring, Elara stepped nearer, her hands folded before herself.

"Kreacher," the man called. His voice cracked at the end and devolved into a hacking cough. "More light, Kreacher. And a chair."

The little scowling imp hadn't followed Elara into the room, and yet a stuffed armchair appeared behind Elara—almost taking her legs out from under her—and the silver candelabrum on the nightstand burst into flames. Elara sat before she could be asked, mostly because she was beginning to feel a mite weak in the knees. Magic could be overwhelming when it happened so suddenly.

The man on the bed surprised Elara. She'd been expecting someone a great deal older, someone in their seventies or eighties—but the man looked barely fifty, aside from the wasting kiss of illness drawing his waxen skin taut and painting perspiration on his brow. In him she saw several of her own features: the black hair with the slight wave to it, the gray eyes, the sharp, symmetrical bones of his cheeks and jaw. He gave her a hard look as his thin chest continued to rise and fall. Elara noticed several letters laying on the duvet at his side, including the one sent off by the goblins.

At length, he said, "You look like him," and fell into a coughing fit once more.

Elara wondered if there was anything she could do and voiced the concern, but he waved it off with a slight flick of the hand.

"There's nothing to do. I'm dying. It's as simple as that. Whatever comfort can be brought to my body does nothing to stop the inevitable." He breathed in and out as he looked at Elara with his brow furrowed. "So you must forgive me for my lack of manners. I am Cygnus of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, the proxy-Head of the family. It is a…relief to meet you."

 _Relief? An odd way to greet someone. Not that my entire life hasn't become decidedly odd._ "I'm…Elara. It's very nice to meet you, Mr Black."

He tutted. "No. That's not how you introduce yourself to the Head of a pure-blood family. It's ' _Elara of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black.'_ " He coughed again, briefly. " _Heir_ to the Black family. And here I didn't think anything could surprise me at this point in time. Tell me, girl. How did you come to be here? Who has been raising you since Sirius got himself incarcerated?"

Elara bit back the urge to pounce on the first question that jumped into her head, wanting to know about Sirius, about who he was and what he'd done, and if that was why she'd been left at St. Giles' as a child. _But why the non-magical world? Why?_ Elara had been taught not to interrupt adults, however. "I was raised at an orphanage in Wiltshire. I…I received my Hogwarts letter, and found out I'm a witch. I left. I'm not going back."

The lines on Cygnus' face deepened and Elara noticed there were threads of silver in the black hair of his brows, a tinge of gray marring the first shadow of a growing beard. " _Muggles_?" he demanded, voice rising. "They left you with _Muggles_?!"

"Yes."

He said something then beneath his breath, something about _Merlin's pants_ that Elara guessed might be a magical euphemism, and looked more ill than ever. "The world's going to the _dogs._ " By ' _dogs_ ," she assumed he meant ' _Muggles._ ' His tone told her as much. "The Ministry can't even keep track of _pure-blood_ magical children, let alone the rest of the rabble. They _assured_ Sirius and Walburga that the premises was checked, but what can you expect from a fool like Millicent _Bagnold_? Of course, she barely lasted long enough to warm the seat for her successor." He paused then to breathe—or wheeze, more like. "But you wouldn't know anything about that, would you?"

Elara stiffened. "No, sir."

"It's not your fault," he replied, voice gruffer than it had been before. "You will be taught. I have enough strength left in this body to see the state of the family better off than it was left to me. You mentioned not returning to that—to that _orphanage_. That's quite out of the picture." Cygnus stopped speaking and cleared his throat, his eyes closing for a long minute of silence interrupted only by the faint crackle in the hearth. "Where are you staying?" he finally asked.

"The Niffler's Nest. It's an inn in Horizont Alley that boards Hogwarts students before the term begins."

"I know of it. You can stay there or you can reside here, if you wish. Merlin knows I could use better company than the house-elf." He wrinkled his nose in that dignified way rich parishioners always screwed up their faces when confronted with a particularly scruffy orphan. Cygnus eyed Elara again, taking in her proper—if worn—attire, her clean shoes, her washed face and cut fingernails. "As I told you, Miss Black, I am dying and it is inevitable, but I won't see this house crumble or fall into the hands of fools like my own children, pledging themselves to madmen or Muggles. _Toujours pur_ , do you know what that means?"

"No. I was taught Latin, not French."

"At least you recognize the language. It means ' _always pure_.' Remember those words. It's the motto of this family, and while some will tout it as a slogan galvanizing hate and the agendas of lesser wizards, that is _not_ what it is. Not originally. _Toujours pur_ means to always be loyal to blood, to family—to _magic_. You are, or will be, the last free member of the House of Black, a family that has existed in Britain since before the Ministry came into being—before the Conqueror even set sail for the Isles—and it will be _your_ responsibility to carry on our noble name."

Elara felt wide-eyed and silly listening to her great uncle speak. Why, just that morning she dressed in her modest bedroom at St. Giles' hearing the morning sermons echo from the adjacent church, and while she'd been exchanging letters with Professor McGonagall for a week now, it hadn't been _real_ until now, until she sat down at the bedside of a dying relative and he regaled her about _lineages_ and _house mottos_ and _magic_.

"Please, Mr Black," she asked softly. "Can you…can you tell me about my parents?"

"I don't know much," he replied, sighing. He began to cough again and struggled to control it, one hand plastered over his mouth as his reddened eyes watered. "Th—that potion there—."

Elara lurched to her feet and followed his pointing finger toward the dusty sideboard. There were several " _potions"_ sitting there in a line of various crystal vials, their contents luminescent and churning at Elara's inspection.

"Th—the pink one."

She grabbed it and brought it back to him. Cygnus drank the infusion, sputtering, and instantly his fit subsided into a grateful gasp of air. Elara took the empty vial from his hand as he slumped against the pillows, clearly exhausted. "I don't know much," he repeated. "Your grandmother, my sister Walburga, was some thirteen years my senior, and so we were never really close. You can find her portrait on one of the landings, howling about blood purity like a Gryffindor who can't string more than two words together." He sniffed. "She married our second cousin Orion—don't make that face at me, girl—and had two sons, Sirius being the eldest. No one's quite sure where his brother, Regulus, got off to."

Elara nodded along, and though she forced her face to remain composed, she still didn't like the idea of her paternal grandparents being _related_ , for goodness' sake. It was technically legal, being second cousins and not first, but _still_.

"As far as I know, Sirius rowed with Walburga and Orion sometime during his Hogwarts years and she had him disowned, but when Regulus disappeared in 79' and Sirius returned with the promise to marry a pure-blood heiress, Walburga had little choice but to accept him back into the family. I actually don't know _who_ he married, though I heard she died early on in 81'. Walburga and I were _hardly_ speaking at the time, differences in political opinions being what they were—but I digress."

"And what happened to Sir—my father? I know he's…incarcerated. For how long?"

"The goblins tell you, then? Oh, he's there for life." Cygnus' eyes gleamed hard like cooling quicksilver. "He killed twelve Muggles and an old school-mate of his with a Blasting Curse. The Hit Wizards found him in the ruins, laughing like a madman. Took him straight to Azkaban with the rest of the Death Eaters they rounded up that day. He besmirched the whole of our house with his idiocy, and you'll bear the brunt of his treachery for years to come. Trust me when I say this, Miss Black; the only part of Sirius that will ever see the outside of an Azkaban cell is his rotting corpse, and even then I have my doubts."

Elara shuddered and shut her eyes. She wished she hadn't asked. She _really_ wished she hadn't.

"I think his punishment fitting," Cygnus said as he sank farther into the pillows and his tired gaze roved from Elara to the far wall, focusing on the empty portrait frame there. "He doesn't know about you, after all. He gets to sit in that prison every day, gets to wake up every morning on that dismal island, and gets to remember again that his only child is dead."

 **A/N: I always wondered if Draco's lack of mention of the Black side of his family was an oversight, written that way for simplicity's sake, or because some kind of family row kept his grandparents distant. In this work, Cygnus is 100% pro pure-blood, but he believes in a little thing called** _ **subtlety**_ **. Looking at you, Walburga. In canon Bagnold was Minister for Magic from 1980-1990. She was replaced early here by a familiar face….**


	10. the boy who lived

_**x. the boy who lived**_

Harriet spent three days reading _The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts_ from cover to cover and didn't feel better when she finished it.

The Dark Arts, she learned, were a kind of particularly punishing magic that was, for the most part, used for the express purpose of _evil_. Spells themselves didn't have morality—but sometimes gathering the things that went into the preparations of the spells _required_ evil, like fresh baby hearts or the eyes of your murder victim, or they needed you to _feel_ evil things like hatred and rage or bloodlust before they could be cast.

The book talked about a witch named Morgana who was said to have brought the Dark Arts to Britain, and who hated Merlin—who actually existed, much to Harriet's shock. Page after page of Dark wizards and witches flipped by under Harriet's hands: Ekrizdis, Herpo the Foul, Godelot, Gormlaith Gaunt, Ethelred the Ever-Ready, and Emeric the Evil—on and on it went. Harriet felt queasy reading about the deeds they'd committed, the books they'd written, the places they'd built. So far, all she'd seen was the wonder of magic, but she soon came to understand magic was also capable of great terror.

When events encroached on the modern era, a curl of dread settled in Harriet's stomach. She learned of Gellert Grindelwald, who sought to dominate the Muggle world with magical might, who met his fate at the hands of a great wizard named Albus Dumbledore—and then he faded, replaced by a new section in the book attributed entirely to the " _Wizarding War_ " and " _The Dark Lord V—._ "

No history of the wizard's past could be found, and not a bloody hint of his name, either. The author referred to him only as " _The Dark Lord_ " or " _V—_ " or " _You Know Who_ ," which Harriet thought incredibly frustrating because _no_ , no she did _not_ know _who_. "V" rallied followers dubbed "Death Eaters" to his cause of pure-blood supremacy, wanting nothing more than the utter subjugation of the non-magical world.

He killed many people. Their names blurred together for Harriet, but she knew she'd see their children at Hogwarts, and that all this was _more_ than some dry history in a book, or a fantastic fairytale about magic battles. This was real, and it was the world she'd been born into with so many others. Fear and uncertainty bled through the yellowing pages like wet ink.

She found her parents listed near the back. The passage read; " _James and Lily Potter were both subjected to the Killing Curse by V— on the evening of October the 31st. V— ruined their residence with a Blasting Curse, overlooking the Potters' daughter, who survived in the wreckage_."

That was it. Nothing about _why_ they'd died, if they'd opposed "V" or if they'd been neutral or just people caught in the crossfire. The author hadn't even included Harriet's name, and though she _really_ didn't want her name written in such a horrid book, it bothered her that she was separated from her parents even in print. _James and Lily Potter_. _The Potters' daughter_. Overlooked, it said. Wallowing, Harriet bitterly muttered that the word basically summed up the whole of her existence until now. _Overlooked_.

The worst part was learning "V" met his fate barely two hours later. His followers, his Death Eaters, raided a home in Dorset and killed a pure-blood witch named Alice Longbottom. The Death Eaters occupied her husband, Frank Longbottom, as "V" entered the home and aimed a Killing Curse at their son, Neville, only for the Dark Lord to vanish with an "agonized scream" before he could finish casting. No one was precisely sure what happened and the author included several interviews from various magical experts who postulated on the phenomenon, but one thing was certain; Neville Longbottom had survived the Dark Lord and was hailed "the Boy Who Lived." He was a hero. The war ended.

Anger and resentment festered in the deepest pits of Harriet's heart. _Two hours_. A decade of war, and her family was torn apart a measly _two hours_ before it ended. Two _bloody_ hours. If "V" had gone to the Longbottom's first, or if he'd stopped for supper or hit buggering magical traffic—Harriet would've spent the last ten years with her mum and dad at home, not living in a cupboard with spiders, not toiling in the garden and hoping she'd get dinner later. She couldn't even figure out the bastard's name.

Harriet hated that petty emotion. It was something the Dursleys would feel; slighted by fate, entitled, fussy and argumentative, like Dudley when he counted his presents and came up short. She wasn't the only one to lose people, not at all. Two hours, two days, two years—what did it matter? James and Lily were dead, and though Harriet was alone now, she had Hogwarts to look forward to, and perhaps friends.

At the bottom of the page, in the footer, her finger traced over the handwritten words " _The best coups are silent._ " In light of everything she'd learned, Harriet could make little sense of the words, so she shoved them from her mind. She snapped the book closed, took a deep breath, and moved on.

On the thirty-first of July, Harriet Potter sprang out of bed more excited than she had ever been on her birthday before.

Her exploration of Diagon Alley and the adjoining lanes had taken her all over in the week Harriet had been boarding at the Leaky Cauldron. She ate ice cream at Florean's almost every day and wandered from there, through Diagon and Horizont, along Empiric Alley and Toad Road all the way to Carkitt Market, where she liked to watch the wizards work at the Bowman E. Wright Blacksmith and listen to explosions coming from Dr Filibuster's Fireworks. A teenage witch intern at Globus Mundi Travel Agency liked to chat with Harriet about all the magical societies scattered around the world, and the clock outside Cogg and Bell Clockmakers always chimed the hour with a series of strange, screaming bird calls. Harriet's favorite stop, though, was The Junk Shop, where she'd poke through all manner of delightful bits and bobs, most of it broken, but some of the stuff quite interesting all the same.

Today, Harriet had a special destination in mind: the Magical Menagerie.

She had seen the owls at Eeylops and cats ran rampant throughout the whole of the Wizarding quarter, but there was only one kind of animal for Harriet and it wasn't allowed at Hogwarts. Resigned, she promised herself she wouldn't stop by the store until her birthday, when she'd go to fawn over the great scaly beasts none of the other witches or wizards seemed inclined pay attention to. It promised to be the best birthday ever.

No bell chimed when Harriet edged open the door to the Magical Menagerie early that afternoon; instead, she was greeted by collective squawking from an—she squinted— _unkindness_ of black-feathered ravens. There were no shelves in the Menagerie; rather, the aisles themselves were comprised of dozens and dozens of cages stacked atop each other, the interior a constant riot of squeals and barks and cries. Several haughty owls lined the top of a rail protruding from the brick wall and they glared at Harriet as she passed them by. A small dog with a forked tail dashed around the store chased by a younger witch spouting muttered obscenities.

The snakes and other less popular pets were kept farther in the store's depths, nearer the smudged windows that looked out over Horizont Alley and the corner of Gringotts. There weren't many there; a few skinny garter snakes, some darkly colored adders, two sleepy cobras with glittering scales of gold, and a very ornery boomslang tearing up his bed of green leaves.

" _Hello_ ," Harriet, crouching down before the glass tanks, whispered. The snakes paused as all snakes did when they suddenly heard Harriet talking to them. " _You're all very pretty_."

The cobras preened like peacocks, if such a thing were possible. " _Misstresss_ ," the garter snakes jabbered. The boomslang's tongue flickered in and out at a rapid pace before it slunk beneath its torn bed and disappeared. Harriet guessed he or she wasn't up for conversation.

" _A Sspeaker?_ "

Startled, Harriet glanced at the larger tank that sat above the others, partially covered by a velvet drape and dark on the inside. Scales glittered in the sparse illumination of the sun, and she reached up to give the drape a gentle nudge or two. Two blue eyes appeared to float in the tank's inky shadows—but, no, there was serpent hidden inside. It was mostly black, body larger than the littler snakes below with silvery scales on its belly and a crown of stubby white horns. A small gemstone that looked like a sapphire rested on the crest of its angular head.

" _Ssspeak_ ," the serpent ordered as its violet tongue flicked out of its mouth. Harriet guessed it to be five feet or so in length, thicker than her arm.

" _I've never seen a snake like you_ ," she blurted, almost nose to nose with the creature on the other side of the glass. Those eyes burned blue and white, fierce and unnaturally intelligent. " _What are you_?"

" _You tell me_ ," the serpent returned. " _If you are ssso sssmart. I call mysself Liviusss_."

Harriet didn't know snakes could have names—or that they could be so snooty. She'd asked the little grass snakes and adders who visited Number Four before, but to the last they seemed confused by the concept. Truly, most snakes Harriet encountered hadn't been terribly bright. They chatted about crickets and mice and had little patience for any other kind of conversation.

" _That's a nice name_ ," Harriet told the serpent. " _You are very pretty._ "

The snake—Livius—scoffed at Harriet. Scoffed! " _You sssaid that to the…othersss_." Given its tone, Livius didn't appear to enjoy the company of his monosyllabic friends in the tanks below.

Harriet blinked. " _Well, you are very pretty. You have a gem on your—err—forehead. I imagine it glitters in the sun."_

Livius lifted its head an increment higher and swayed as it continued to study Harriet. " _I wouldn't know. I wasss hatched in thiss placcce. The ssun iss beyond me._ "

" _How terrible_."

Livius swayed again, the motion hypnotic. " _Yesss. Terrible…Misstresss._ "

"Are you talking to that snake?"

Harriet jumped and blushed when she realized how close her nose had gotten to the glass. "Um." Turning, she found a girl about her age standing nearby, though she rose a full head taller than poor Harriet in height. She wore black wizarding robes with silver thread tooled about the wide sleeves and the high collar, a little pin with a crest attached to the lapel. The girl was much prettier than Harriet, she noted with chagrin, her black hair neatly brushed and gathered in a bun at the nape of her neck, her gray eyes able to look about without the obnoxious cover of thick glasses or a wild fringe. She had a bent notebook in her slender hands.

"Yeah," Harriet finally admitted. The girl leaned nearer the tank to peek at the serpent inside, her lips tipping into a slight frown.

"I didn't know witches or wizards could do that," the girl said.

"I didn't know either." Harriet wondered how many others spoke to snakes. Perhaps it was one of those things in the long list of things that made Harriet _odd_ , even among magical folk. "This one's kind of bossy."

"Bossy?"

"Yeah. All the snakes I've found in the garden before just want to chat about bugs or where the sunniest spot is to nap. Two grass snakes once argued over which rock in the flowerbed was best, so they both napped on the rocks for about an hour while I weeded to test the theory."

The corner of the girl's lips twitched into a lopsided smirk, which looked a bit odd on her otherwise prim face. "How strange."

Harriet shrugged, self-conscious.

"Do you know what kind of snake it is—?"

A shadow fell across the pair, and together they glanced up into the face of an older wizard with a tremendous mustache. "A Horned Serpent," he said as he brusquely shoved by them and went to properly cover the tank again. Livius hissed with displeasure as it disappeared from view. "An exceedingly rare and exceedingly _expensive_ male specimen from North America. It's also quite venomous and _not_ for sale to children. Move along."

The clerk chivvied them back toward the shop's front, which was crowded with kittens and a litter of those playful fork-tailed puppies. "Well, that's rude," the other girl murmured, watching the wizard walk away from the corner of her eye. "Seems an odd choice to keep the creature in the shop then scare off potential customers."

Harriet shrugged again. "I can't buy it anyway. Hogwarts doesn't allow snakes, and where would I keep a thing like that? With my socks?" Chuckling, she poked a finger through the bars of a box containing oddly purring puffballs puddled together. A long pink tongue slipped out to lick Harriet's skin. "Oh, gross."

The girl didn't reply. Harriet glanced about and saw that she had her pale gaze fixated on something occurring out on the street. Harriet craned her neck to see over the top of a crate and through the window, but all she could really see was the backside of a plump wizard talking with the witch next to him. A number of people were clustered in the alley now, all facing something obscured from view.

"Wonder what that's all about," Harriet commented. The girl shook her head in silent answer, then moved toward the rail of owls Harriet had spotted at her entree. Harriet followed along, unsure of what else to do, and the girl didn't appear to mind.

"I need an owl," she said. Harriet decided the statement was directed at her and took the chance at conversation.

"An owl? They have a ton at Eeylops Owl Emporium. It's on the other side of Gringotts. They're a lot more—." Harriet glanced at one of the glowering screech owls. "Friendly."

"I didn't like any of those." The girl pursed her lips as she studied her choices. She had a calm mien, quiet and considerate, relaxed. Harriet, who didn't know how to act in situations like this, felt antsy and wagered that the other girl probably had plenty of Wizarding friends, so it was just Harriet who was awkward and anxious like Aunt Petunia just before Dudley started in on one of his really nasty tantrums.

The door to the shop jerked open and Harriet jumped at the sudden clamor of voices. A boy slipped inside. The door was promptly closed by a wizard wearing maroon robes with fitted attire underneath, who then leaned against the door to prevent it from being opened again. Harriet—who had spent far too many years locked in the cupboard—didn't much like being trapped in a shop, but she swallowed her protests and turned her attention back to the owls.

The girl held up her arm, bent at the elbow, and one of the largest creatures hopped down. Harriet thought it was the meanest looking one of the bunch, with furious golden eyes and a face set in a permanent scowl, but he hooted softly at the girl and gave her fingers a gentle nip. She stroked the glossy black feathers, revealing spots of brown and gray around the back of the bird's head.

"It'd be really useful to have an owl," Harriet babbled. She fussed with the sleeves of her new casual robes. "And he's really big. He could probably carry mail far without getting tired. I read that Hogwarts is in Scotland, so he looks like he could make it back to London without a problem. That's, err, if you _are_ going to Hogwarts and _do_ need to write letters to London…." Harriet subsided into silence.

"…I think I'll get him," the girl replied, voice distant as if lost in thought. She blinked then and gave Harriet a small smile. "I'm sorry for being rude. I'm Elara, and I _am_ starting Hogwarts this year."

Harriet grinned in return. "I'm Harriet."

A loud gasp from the store's manager had Harriet jumping yet again, and the owl on Elara's arm gave his wings an indignant flap. The mustachioed wizard and the younger witch Harriet had seen chasing the dog were both standing by the blond boy who had come inside, the wizard seemingly in raptures and the witch gushing on.

"—and I wasn't even supposed to come in today, it was supposed to be Maggie, it was—."

"—the wife won't even _believe_ me when I tell her—."

"—Morgana's _knickers_ , if I can't even believe it, Belinda's going to be over the moon. Wait until I tell Maggie—."

"—the Boy Who Lived, in _my_ shop!"

 _Oh_ , Harriet thought as she stared at the boy who was no older than herself. Youth still clung to the round cheeks of his face and the wide grin he plastered on didn't quite reach his eyes, but his posture oozed easy confidence and he had a cocky set to his jaw, chin tipped up and one hand propped on his hip like he practiced the pose in the mirror.

"Can we have your autograph, Mr. Longbottom? Oh, it would just be such a treat for Belinda—."

The boy gave a slight nod, still smiling, and said, "Of course, sir."

That ugly seed of resentment still rattled about in Harriet's middle as she looked at Neville Longbottom and she squashed the emotion, feeling small and ugly herself for that bitter voice in the back of her head. He took the quill and parchment proffered to him by the wizard and signed his name with a flourish.

Elara watched the scene, the frown once more set on her face. The witch and wizard continued to prattle on and on.

"We should get him some owl treats," Harriet said, wanting to do _something_ besides stand there like a numpty with her stomach full of spiderwebs. "And a cage. I saw some over here…."

Harriet and Elara ventured deeper into the store again and Elara lifted the owl to her shoulder so she could lower her arm. She grabbed a cage off a rack and Harriet sussed out a package of owl treats from behind a bag of lime green fish food.

"Do you reckon he'll like these?" Harriet asked as they started toward the front of the store with the purchases in hand. Elara was rather quiet and Harriet hoped she wasn't bugging the other girl. She tended to be a chatty when nervous. "I mean, I don't know if they come in different flavors or anything. Mrs Figg used to babysit me, and she had all these cats and said they each liked a different kind of canned food—."

They almost bumped into Neville Longbottom coming out of the aisle. Both girls took a step back and Harriet suppressed a grimace.

"Sorry about that," he said with another quick grin. He looked between Elara and Harriet, then asked, "You don't want autographs, do you?"

It was the awkward sort of question Harriet could've never asked with that level of aplomb, but Neville pulled it off as if he did so regularly—which he probably did, considering his level of celebrity. "Er," Harriet said, fiddling with corner of the owl treats bag until it frazzled. _Shoot_. "No thanks…?"

He blinked, taken aback, like no one had ever turned down an autograph from the _Boy Who Lived_ before. The more Harriet thought on it, the sillier the name sounded. He was the Boy Who Lived and everyone else was the People Who Died or the People Who Are Just Grateful A Murderer Isn't Hanging About Anymore.

Neville didn't look as surefooted as he had a few minutes ago. He acted as if Harriet had gone wildly off script and now he had to improvise.

"If you'll excuse us," Elara said, breaking the awkward silence. "We have somewhere to be."

"Sure, uh—."

Elara stepped around the boy, keeping a polite distance despite the abruptness of her exit, and Harriet scuttled after her. She was grateful for the excuse to leave Neville behind and would have thanked the other girl, had Elara seemed remotely interested in being thanked. The wizard behind the register was still exchanging excited whispers with his assistant, so Elara had to clear her throat to get his attention as she set the ungainly cage on the counter and urged the great horned owl inside of it.

Miffed, the wizard gave Elara her total, and instead of reaching for her purse, the girl asked to borrow the wizard's quill and used it to write something down inside that notebook she'd been carrying since Harriet first saw her. Harriet watched as Elara carefully detached a slip of parchment from the binding, and the inked numbers on the slip glowed for a second before the parchment vanished, only to be replaced by a small pile of gleaming Galleons.

"Wicked!" Harriet said. "And here I've been lugging about all those bloody coins. It's like checks!"

"A bit," Elara admitted as she accepted the cage with her owl and the wizard shrunk the treats down so they could fit inside her pocket. "My guardian showed them to me."

The wizard dressed in maroon robes opened the door and helped them through the crowd standing just outside. The throng had multiplied in the past several minutes. They called Longbottom's name and were disappointed when two girls came out instead. Harriet wondered how Neville dealt with popularity like that. She had difficulty with simple conversation, let alone being some kind of international idol.

"It was really nice to meet you," Harriet said to Elara once they broke out of the milling bodies and began to part ways. The other girl seemed to be headed back toward the Leaky Cauldron while Harriet wanted to return to Gringotts and see about getting one of those nifty checkbooks. Maybe she could bribe Griphook into saying 'happy birthday.'

"You as well." Elara turned to leave—then paused, facing Harriet once more with a determined expression. She jostled the owl about and extended a hand.

Smiling, Harriet offered her own hand and they shook. _Is this what it's like to have a friend?_ Harriet didn't know, but excitement unfurled in her belly at the prospect of finding out. Elara departed then, and Harriet called after her with a happy wave.

"See you at Hogwarts!"

 **A/N: Dumbledore's initial fear in allowing Harry to grow up in the Wizarding world was that he'd become incredibly arrogant and self-centered. I think Neville, raised in that image from infancy (by a father who survived as well), would have developed a different personality than the one we know—or, at least, would display a more forthright and self-assured exterior than may be present on the inside.**

 **No Hedwig :(. If Hagrid hadn't have been there in Harry's story, I have to wonder if he would have gotten a pet at all.**


	11. snake thief

_**xi. snake thief**_

All in all, the life and future of Harriet Potter looked brighter than they ever had before.

Others may have thought her birthday a miserable event. Other little girls received presents or had parties to which their friends were all invited, cards were sent by relatives who lived too far away, and they would blow out the candles atop their cake before the wax could melt. While Harriet had none of that, she did have cake flavored ice-cream at Florean Fortescue's, chatted with a magical snake, and even met another girl who was about her age. She wasn't smacked for burning breakfast, wasn't given an extra long list of chores, and wasn't shoved in a spidery cupboard under a set of stairs.

It was, in Harriet's opinion, the best birthday ever.

She returned to her room after having a hearty dinner down in the pub—and was almost instantly assaulted by a shrieking ball of feathers. "Ouch! Alright— _ouch_!" Harriet snapped as she caught the owl. It beat its gray wings against her head as she tried to untangle the crinkled letter from about its leg and, when the string finally came loose, the barmy bird rocketed away with a final shriek, clipping the sill as it sailed out the open window and into the encroaching night.

"What was that for?!" Harriet demanded of the retreating owl, rubbing her cuffed ear as she scowled at the feathers scattered on the floor. Shutting the door and adjusting her glasses, Harriet examined the letter—then let out a soft sound of exclamation when she recognized the swirling green script. It was a letter from Hogwarts, not that she expected anyone _else_ to write to her. She tore through the seal and pulled out the missive, something heavier than parchment slipping through her fingers to fall like the owl's lost feathers on the floor.

"' _Dear Miss Potter_ ,'" she read aloud. "' _Thank you for your reply. We look forward to having you join us here at Hogwarts. Enclosed is your ticket for the train that departs from Platform Nine and Three-Quarters, King's Cross Station, at precisely eleven on September first.'_ Three-quarters?" Harriet muttered under her breath, brow furrowed. What did she mean by that? "' _Wishing you many happy returns on your birthday, Deputy Headmistress McGonagall_.'" Harriet blinked. "Hey, she knows it's my birthday!"

Of course, no one answered her, but Harriet was pleased nonetheless. Harriet couldn't remember ever being wished a happy birthday sincerely. Dudley would sometimes shout "Happy birthday!" before punching her in the arm or pulling her hair, but Harriet didn't count that. She tucked the letter back into its envelope and knelt to pick up the ticket, testing the thick edges of the cardstock as she saw for certain that she was expected to board the Hogwarts Express from Platform Nine _and Three-Quarters_ on the first.

"Well _that's_ helpful." Rolling her eyes, she tucked the ticket into the new Galleon register she'd gotten from Gringotts earlier that day, setting it aside on the wobbly table. Harriet heaved a sigh and peered out the window toward the lights of London— _Muggle_ London, that is. She saw how the air appeared to ripple and warp with color, like sunshine on an opal, and how it seemed to redirect and turn the train tracks away from the magic alley behind the crooked pub. Everything in her view was spotty because of magic and how it came into contact with the mundane. Harriet couldn't help but stare at those odd anomalies. She thought they were pretty.

" _Sss…Missstressss_ …."

Startled, Harriet spun in place, expecting to find someone behind her, but there was no one. The room remained empty aside from herself and her shadow, though she didn't know if Set was still there. Movement from the hearth caught Harriet's eye and, breath held, she watched as a familiar head poked up from the side of the armchair.

" _Missstresss_."

" _W-what are you doing here?!_ " Harriet sputtered as the Horned Serpent uncoiled himself and came nearer. His black scales flashed and sparkled in the gas lamps when he moved.

" _You are my Missstresss, little Ssspeaker_."

" _Yes, I bloody well heard you_ ," Harriet swore as the snake rose and swayed at her eye level. At least she knew why the owl had been panicking. " _How did you get out of your cage?!_ "

" _They cannot keep me from you._ " If snakes could shrug, Harriet bet her very last quid—or, well, Knut—that the snake in front of her would have done so. " _Humansss are easssily fooled_."

" _They're also going to think I stole you!_ " Harriet threw her hands into the air, irked and more than a little unsettled. Did the store owner know the ' _highly venomous_ ' snake in his collection could slip his containment whenever he fancied? " _We have to go back!_ "

Livius let out a long stream of nonsensical hisses and Harriet yelped when she felt cool, dry scales flowing over her legs. She jumped, aiming to free herself, but the serpent wound his tail around her ankles and Harriet toppled onto her backside with a loud "Oof!" Her head narrowly missed the edge of the table.

" _We will not go back_ ," Livius said as he came face to face with Harriet again and his violet tongue flicked in and out. " _Foolisssh Ssspeaker_."

" _Oh, that's nice_ ," Harriet said, voice testy. She gave his coils a shove but they only tightened. " _Calling me foolish when all I want to do is get to school without being bloody arrested first!_ "

" _What isss arresssted?_ " Livius asked. Harriet paused in her mounting tirade to study the serpent. _Can snakes lie?_ Harriet didn't think so—at least, not before she met Livius, who was much smarter than the little mundane snakes who hung around Privet Drive. Really, it would figure even the snakes were dumb in Little Whinging.

" _It's where they put you in a cage and don't let you out_ ," Harriet explained. Livius hissed.

" _No cagesss. No cagesss for you, no cagesss for me_."

Suddenly, the sapphire on Livius' brow sparked—and the serpent vanished. Harriet yelped and Livius gave his coils another squeeze so she could feel them still looped about her ankles and calves. He hadn't vanished; was _invisible!_

The serpent returned, blinking into view without a sound, gone and then not, quick as could be. _Like magic_. "Bloody hell," Harriet whispered as she raised a tentative hand and brought it out to touch his head. Livius butted his nose against her fingertips in approval. Honestly, she had no clue how to go about returning a rather large snake to the Menagerie, especially if he didn't _want_ to go. The mustachioed wizard at the counter hadn't been very nice, and Harriet had no doubt she'd be blamed for the Horner Serpent's escape if she came skipping in with him slung about her neck. Did wizards have the equivalent of a lost and found?

Something Livius had said earlier in the day stuck with Harriet; " _I wouldn't know. I was hatched in this place. The sun is beyond me."_

Sometimes, Harriet felt like she had been born in that stupid boot cupboard, hatched just like Livius and stuffed into the dark like a scaly, terrifying _Thing_ the Dursleys didn't understand and didn't want ruining their furniture—but at least she knew what the sun was like, knew enough to love and miss it.

She touched his nose, then the gem atop his head, marveling at the heat of it beneath her touch. " _I'm going to call you Livi_ ," Harriet decided with a nod. She had no clue what he ate, but she surmised Livi would make sure she knew.

His tongue flicked at faster speeds. " _Do not likesss_ ," he hissed, displeasure plain in the harsh rasp of his tone.

" _Livius is too snooty._ "

" _What isss sssnooty?_ "

" _You. You're snooty_."

The serpent unwound his tail with a huff of air and slithered over to the bed, which he promptly hid beneath for a good sulking. Harriet saw Set swirl beneath her feet, amused.

Sitting on the floor with a sore backside, watching a serpent pout while her shadow laughed, Harriet decided that though she may never be _normal_ , she was more than okay with being _odd_. She couldn't wait for September to begin.

 **A/N: Apparently, the gem on the Horned Serpents has invisibility and flying properties which make it highly sought after. I imagine they use these skills for hunting in the wild.**

 **Phew, on to Hogwarts now! The exposition took much longer than I thought D: Kept having to split chapters up with my long-winded rambling.**

 **Thanks Ventari SylerFox and annavale23 for the reviews! 3**


	12. not slytherin

_**xii. not slytherin**_

King's Cross buzzed with noise like an active beehive, people hustling in every direction, calling out to loved ones and checking watches or timetables, mothers holding the hands of fussy children while harried travelers ran by. The noise pressed upon Harriet as she stood halfway between Platform Nine and Platform Ten, glaring at a bit of wall.

There was some kind of invisible bubble surrounding the area because the Muggles going about their business avoided the space, turning their heads and bodies away without noticing—which was all well and good, as wizards were _not_ the most subtle of people. Harriet had seen a whole gaggle of red-headed witches and wizards go by pushing trolleys loaded with magical things, and though she had wanted to ask the mother for help, Harriet had hung back, anxious and perspiring, until it was too late.

She'd observed several people slip through the bloody wall now and she guessed it was where the Platform was—but what if it was more difficult than it appeared? What if there was a password or some kind of secret phrase or look or spell? Harriet thought she might literally sink into a puddle of her own embarrassment if she cracked her head on the bricks by running full on at a _wall._

 _Well,_ she thought as she gave Livi's head a gentle rub through the fabric of her shirt. The serpent had wrapped himself about her torso, comfortable as could be, and was disinclined to leave. Harriet's blouse was loose enough to accommodate him and he stayed invisible while in public at her request. She simply appeared a tad _lumpier_. _I haven't come this far to fail now. Here goes nothing_.

Tightening her grip on the handle of her trunk, Harriet set a brisk pace and aimed for the wall. She came closer, ten steps away, eight, five—she shut her eyes and threw out a hand, almost certain it'd collide with bricks—but Harriet felt nothing. She just kept walking, and walking, until she _did_ collide with something, though it was much softer than a wall.

"Watch yourself!" the wizard said in gentle reprimand as he gripped Harriet's shoulder to steady her. Harriet blinked at him—then whipped about to face the barrier behind her. It stood brazen and solid as ever, which meant not very solid at all, apparently. _I did it! There was nothing to worry about!_

A scarlet steam engine puffed plumes of white as it idled on the tracks. Families crowded the platform, parents with their arms wrapped around their children, children desperately trying to escape their cooing ministrations. Owls shrieked in their cages, cats tried to evade their owners, and one boy with dreadlocks had a box with a tarantula hidden inside, and spectators gathered to stare and squeal. Not being overfond of spiders after a childhood stuck in the dark with them, Harriet gave the boy and his pet a wide berth.

Some students struggled to boost their heavy trunks that final step from the platform to the train itself, so Harriet paused to help one of those red-heads she'd seen earlier heft his luggage up onto the steps, then went off to find a seat. Harriet's dithering in the station meant most of the compartments had already filled and many students had thrown their Hogwarts robes on over their Muggle attire. She felt a mite too shy to intrude where the older kids were already happily chatting away, so Harriet continued along the train in hopes of finding an empty compartment, or one with other first years like herself.

Luckily, she stumbled upon the person she'd been looking forward to seeing again.

"Elara!" Harriet chirped, surprising the taller girl out of her reading. She was looking over a journal, and not one very well-written if her squinting was anything to go by. Next to her on the seat rested a covered owl cage, but the compartment was otherwise empty. "Is—is that bench taken?"

"Hello, Harriet," Elara said with half a smile. "No, it's free. Go on."

"Thanks." She pulled her trunk over the threshold and let the door slide shut on its own. Elara set the journal aside to help Harriet heft her trunk into the rack overhead, not because it was heavy, but because the bloody thing was almost the same size as Harriet herself and levering it over her head could be tricky. "Thanks," she muttered again. They settled in their seats.

The crowd began to thin on the station as students got on the train and some parents went on their way. Harriet saw that red-headed family again, or at least the mother and the daughter, the latter clinging tearfully to her mother's skirts as she waved at her brothers. Harriet thought that was nice—well, not the _crying_ , but that the girl would miss her siblings, that she hated to see them go. The closest Harriet had to a sibling was Dudley, and he'd sooner throw Harriet onto the tracks than wish her well.

By unlucky chance, Harriet glanced toward the far end of the platform and saw a group revolving around a trio crossing toward the train. She recognized Neville Longbottom and fought against a grimace. He followed his dad—a taller wizard with prominent ears and an argyle sweater under his maroon robes—and a blond witch who had her arm linked through Mr Longbottom's. Harriet remembered reading that Neville's mum had been killed, so she guessed Mr Longbottom eventually remarried.

That ugly feeling in Harriet's middle twisted itself into painful knots as the blond witch smoothed Neville's already tidy hair and he shooed her away, grinning. The crowd cheered when he stepped off the platform.

Harriet ground her teeth.

Elara kept reading and didn't appear up for conversation. Where were her parents? She'd mentioned a "guardian," Harriet recalled, at the Menagerie. Maybe her family had died in the war, too. The Wizarding world had an awful lot of orphans.

The train set on its journey, releasing a final mournful whistle that echoed into the distance as the wheels turned and the station faded. Those opalescent distortions Harriet had first noted at the Leaky Cauldron happened here, too, where the mundane and magical collided, pushing back the Muggle world to let just a thin sliver of the magical one exist, hiding the tracks and the steam engine from Muggle eyes. Staring out the window, Harriet felt like they were traveling through a great soap bubble, one that didn't burst until they were well away from the city proper.

Harriet fiddled with her sleeves and with her glasses and with the snake napping under her clothes, then pulled out her own book from the satchel looped about her neck. She didn't really want to read, so she just pretended to thumb through the pages of _Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them_ , pausing whenever one of the sketched images caught her attention.

London disappeared soon enough, dwindling as if it'd never been, and Harriet couldn't seem to tear her eyes away from the shifting scenery as her heart flip-flopped in her chest. The Dursleys never took her anywhere, not even to London, so Harriet couldn't recall a time when she'd ever been this far away from home. Of course, Harriet also didn't _have_ a home now. She was on her way to school, and when summer rolled about again in ten months, she would have to figure out where to go from there.

The compartment door slid open and a bushy-haired girl slipped inside. She slammed the door closed again as she ducked down on the floor, alarming Harriet and earning a raised brow from her silent companion. Harriet met the girl's brown eyes and a jolt of recognition went through her; this was Hermione Granger, who she met briefly in Madam Malkin's.

Hermione lifted a finger to her lips in a universal plea for silence.

A minute later, a familiar blond boy went sauntering by with two larger counterparts far too reminiscent of Dudley. Draco, as she remembered his name, glanced inside their compartment and missed Hermione sitting crouched below the window, so he simply sneered at Harriet before moving on.

"Thank goodness," Hermione breathed, standing. She straightened the hem of her skirt and pulled on the shade's cord, bringing it down to hide the outer corridor from view. She'd already changed into her school robes. "I'm terribly sorry for barging in like that—oh but you're Harriet! We met at Diagon Alley!" Hermione's relief became more genuine as she sat on the seat next to Harriet and extended her hand. "I'm Hermione Granger, if you don't recall."

"Hi, Hermione. It's nice to see you." They shook hands. Harriet was pleased to meet her again, as Hermione seemed far more enthusiastic about her presence than Elara did. "Was that your, er, brother?"

Hermione glanced at the door over her shoulder before shaking her head. "No, _definitely_ not. I'm just being fostered by his family."

"Doesn't—doesn't that make him your foster brother, then?" Harriet asked, confused. She'd known a few foster children in primary and they'd been almost as bullied as Harriet had been.

"Don't be silly. I'm Muggle-born." Hermione gave Harriet a funny look. "I thought you were Muggle-born too?"

Harriet didn't know what being Muggle-born had to do with fostering, though after a month of listening to conversations in the Wizarding quarter, she knew she wasn't Muggle-born herself, even if Lily _had_ been a Muggle like her Aunt Petunia. "Uh," Harriet said, trying to change the conversation. "This—this is Elara! Elara, this is Hermione."

Thankfully, Elara lowered the journal to grant Hermione a small smile and a nod. "Nice to meet you."

"Likewise."

Hermione turned her gaze back to Harriet, obviously expecting an answer to her question. Harriet cursed in her head. "Well, my dad was a wizard," she said slowly. "But I was raised with relatives who didn't like him all that much, so I never learned a lot about him or my mum. What about you? Did…did something happen to your parents? You don't have to talk about it if it did. I'm just being nosy."

"No, my parents are perfectly fine." A furrow appeared between Hermione's brow as she bit her lower lip. "There's a law, you see. The Muggle-born Protection Act of 1982, or the 'MPA'. I didn't realize there were witches or wizards who didn't know about it."

"What's the law do?"

"It—well, in simple terms, it says Muggle-borns who accept a place at Hogwarts must leave the Muggle world and be fostered by a proper Wizarding family."

Harriet blinked, then gawked when the full implication of Hermione's words bowled her over. "D'you mean they took you away from your parents?!"

"No! No, of course not," Hermione said with a harried huff. "I _chose_ to leave—and I get to spend time with them over the winter holidays, so that's…something. Really, the MPA is a _good_ thing. It was contested when it first came out, the war having just ended, but tensions with the Muggle-world were high in the wake of You-Know-Who's atrocities, and the Ministry decided that children who presented with magical abilities would be safer among their own—own _kind_ , and statistically speaking there's been a fifty-three percent reduction in Muggle-on-wizard violence since the last report in the seventies—."

Hermione went on in this vein for a time, and though she had all kinds of information to back up the ' _efficacy_ '—a word Harriet knew she'd have to look up later—of the MPA law, she sounded as if she were trying to convince herself as well as Harriet. Harriet was uncertain. It seemed horrifying, being taken away from one's parents, but what the bloody hell did _she_ know about parents? What if there were mums and dads out there who treated their magical kids like Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon treated Harriet? Didn't they deserve a chance to escape that?

It didn't sit right with her. Harriet thought of her own mum and dad and longed to know what they would have said, what they were like.

Hermione and Harriet chatted together until a witch pushing a trolley of food stopped by and they bought lunch, the conversation lulling. Hermione took one look at the display of sweets and stuck up her nose, muttering about her parents being dentists, while Harriet got some of everything and Elara took two Cauldron Cakes after giving the treats a dubious stare.

Truly, Harriet was again reminded of how splendid magic was when she ripped open a Chocolate Frog package only for the frog to leap free. Elara caught the escapee with little effort, proving she wasn't quite as distant as she appeared. They both sampled a few beans from the box of Bertie Bott's —until they bit into something foul and promptly shoved the box aside. Harriet entertained herself with the sugary trove while Hermione unfurled a copy of the Daily Prophet and read. The occasional rustle of a turning page broke the silence.

"Hmm…they still haven't found that rare Horned Serpent that went missing from the Magical Menagerie."

Harriet choked on a frog's leg and started coughing. On the other bench, Elara glanced up from the journal and gave Harriet a curious look.

"That's, ah, interesting." Beneath her shirt, the snake in question shifted in his sleep. "Hermione—speaking of Diagon, what were you talking about with Draco at Madam Malkin's? If you don't mind me asking?"

Hermione wrinkled her nose at the mention of the pale blond. "The Hogwarts Houses," she replied, tone crisp. "Did you ever learn more about them?"

"I did! I read ' _Hogwarts: A History'_ like you said—or, at least some of it." The book contained an equal measure of fascinating information and tedious facts. Really, there was only so much Harriet wanted to know about sediment analyses or plumbing updates throughout the centuries.

A bright smile broke over Hermione's face. "Isn't it just so _interesting_? I've read it cover to cover twice now—but never mind that. You said you read about the Houses. Which do you think you'll be in?"

"I'm not sure," Harriet admitted. "The book talked a lot about being ambitious or witty or courageous or hardworking, and I don't think I'm any of those, really."

Hermione nodded along in thought. "Well, no one knows for certain where they'll be until they arrive. There's a ceremony that Sorts incoming students, but I couldn't find any information on _how_ the Sorting occurs exactly. I've been told it's ' _meant to be a surprise_.'"

Nervous, Harriet prayed there wasn't a test waiting for her the moment she stepped foot into the school. She'd tried to read her textbooks, but the sheer flood of information Harriet had been forced to assimilate was mind-numbing. What if they asked her to do magic? Would she be able to?

"I think Ravenclaw would be excellent," Hermione said. "Or Gryffindor. Both are my top choices—but as I was telling Draco, none of the Houses are truly superior to any other. Ravenclaws are known for being bookish, and I know I'm a bit bookish myself—." Hermione's cheek colored. "—so that's where I'll most likely end up, even though I'd love to be a Gryffindor. Being a Hufflepuff would be nice, too." She paused. "But not Slytherin. No, not Slytherin."

Harriet frowned as she tried to remember all that she'd read about the Houses. "What's wrong with Slytherin?"

"Nothing," Hermione said in a voice that meant _everything_. "Nothing at all. It's a perfectly respectable House. I just…the Malfoys have all been Slytherins since they first started attending the school, and _Draco_ will most certainly follow his family's legacy. I don't think I could stand having to stay in the same dormitories as him."

"That's a bit silly," Elara commented. Having been quiet for most of the journey, her sudden input startled Hermione. "Allowing one person to sully an entire House for you."

"It's not that alone," Hermione replied, red darkening her face again. "It's—I don't believe I would be a good fit for Slytherin, that's all!"

Unimpressed, Elara replied with a simple "Hmm," and lowered her attention to the journal again. Hermione opened her mouth to argue—when a voice echoed through the train compartments.

" _We will be arriving at the Hogsmeade Station within a half hour. Students are reminded to leave their pets and luggage on board, and to change into their uniforms before disembarking_."

Harriet let out a relieved breath and stood, shuffling through her satchel to find the robes she'd stashed in there. She and Elara both changed while Hermione disappeared behind the newspaper again, grumbling. Nervous excitement bubbled in Harriet's chest once she sat and looked out the window at the darkening horizon. How many hours had passed? A half dozen, at least. Across from her, Elara finally tucked her reading away. She pulled on her sleeves until they mostly covered her hands.

The train slowed until it stopped, brakes squealing, white plumes drifting by the window, and sound in the outer corridor doubled. Harriet gave her middle a pat to make certain Livi remained in place as she rose and tucked her satchel with her trunk. Hermione lifted the window's shade, peeking into the corridor. A group of older students with robes trimmed in blue passed, and Hermione shoved the door open. "Let's hurry, shall we?"

Hermione obviously wished to avoid Draco, so Harriet went along with her. She glanced behind her to see Elara following with the same impassive expression she'd worn all afternoon, though she didn't let a boisterous boy trimmed in red cut between her and Harriet when he came charging out of his own compartment. Harriet heard the whispers again, Longbottom's name caught on every tongue, people standing on tip top and craning their necks to look about.

No one gave three random girls a second glance.

Outside, the dark closed about them, thick as lamb's wool, and Harriet gazed at the sky bursting with stars overhead. The vastness of the revealed universe reminded Harriet how very small she was, how truly insignificant. While some despaired at being so negligible, Harriet thought it freeing. She was but one leaf on a towering tree where a thousand leaves had grown before, and no matter how alone she felt, others had been in her shoes before, staring at that sky, and someone always would be.

Hermione jostled Harriet's arm to hurry her along.

"Firs' years! Firs' years! This way, Firs' years!"

A giant of a man loomed above the milling students with a lit lantern in his massive hand. At his side stood another adult, a sour-faced, bespectacled wizard with broad shoulders and hair so light it appeared transparent. "Be swift, now. Allow the incoming first years passage—yes that means you, Mr Leovitch. Out of the way—."

Harriet started to fidget again, patting Livi or her wand tucked into the new leather brace on her wrist. The breeze sighed through the eerie wood surrounding the station, and Harriet swore she saw the gleam of eyes watching them. The older students hurried to the platform's end where a line of carriages drawn by skeletal horses waited.

"That all o' you lot?" the giant boomed as he swung his lantern about and almost clipped his companion in the head. "Alright then. This way!"

They started along a steep path into the woods, stumbling in the dark on the narrow slip of gravel and stone, their tremulous voices vibrating with excitement and trepidation. At the path's end rested the shore of a great, still lake—and on the cliff's edge across the water waited an ancient castle comprised of Saxon turrets and Gothic spires, a sleeping dragon with stone spines sprawled upon the hill, waiting for them to come nearer. Harriet wasn't the only one to gasp.

 _Hogwarts_. _I'm really here. It's real_.

"Only four to a boat, lest you want to capsize before you even get to the school!" the older wizard called. Harriet hadn't noticed the small fleet of boats resting on the shore at first. Harriet clamored in after Hermione and Elara—and they were swiftly joined by Draco, who almost shoved Harriet headfirst into the lake when he jumped into the boat as well.

"Granger," he said, snide. "Have a nice train ride with your Mudblood pals?"

Hermione glowered at the boy and didn't answer.

The boats jerked into motion. Harriet held on with both hands and Livi tightened his coils, stirring beneath the rippling cover her robes, his voice rising in a hiss barely audible above the smooth lapping of the lake's water against the bow.

" _We are almossst there?_ "

" _Soon_ ," Harriet replied into her collar, earning a bewildered look from Elara. It always sounded like English to Harriet, but she knew from experiences with Dudley creeping up on her that her conversations with snakes came out in odd, rasping hisses.

They docked at a small harbor carved through the solid rock of the cliff's face, where the shifting water echoed and the smell of algae thickened in their noses. The shorter wizard urged them out of the boats and up a flight of stone steps illuminated by torchlight. The stairs led their whispering group up to the hill's crest, then across a lawn speckled in evening dew, the castle glittering overhead as it watched the first years approach.

 _This is home now,_ Harriet thought. She was caught in the wonder and mystique, gliding with the others by touch alone, unable to look away. _This is going to be my home for the next seven years_.

Ahead waited the great black doors leading into the castle proper. The bespectacled wizard lifted a hand and knocked.

 **A/N: Someone mentioned not liking the main pairing (Snape / Harriet), which I can understand. I just wanted to mention this fic is mostly Gen / Friendship / Mentor oriented with a heavy emphasis on plot, and absolutely nothing occurs with any underage students. No inappropriate shenanigans. The pairing is a very distant thing that doesn't come up until the end. So, really, the story is about the adventure (and the absolutely wild plot twists I have planned, *wink, wink*).**


	13. in your head

_**xiii. in your head**_

Minerva led them inside, a tail of slack-jawed miscreants who walked before the inquisitive attention of the student body and stared at the ceiling, the candles, and the High Table with its stern array of waiting professors. They watched with their eyes wide open and unblinking.

Severus watched them too, his fingers tapping a soundless rhythm against his thigh.

He found the faces he knew first. Picking out the spawn of his _associates_ proved a simple feat, even when Severus hadn't seen some of their number in years. Parkinson and Goyle, Crabbe and Nott, and of course Lucius' boy. There were others. He knew they slunk among their number even now, innocent faces and innocent soul who would be lulled by the Dark no matter how hard Severus or Albus or any of their professors tried to push them away. The latest passel of Death Eaters had arrived, but the question remained; who would they serve?

Severus lowered his gaze to the table and exhaled.

Merlin, he was tired.

Minerva set the Sorting Hat upon the stool, and it began to sing.

 **xXxXx**

The last of the song died away amid generous applause.

Elara wrung her hands as the stern witch in square glasses started to call out names. It was happening too quickly—far, far too quickly. Her name was high in the alphabet, it was only a matter of time—.

She had learned much about her family in the past month. Too much.

"Black, Elara!"

The call stirred whispers in the hall like small bodies thrashing in the underbrush, animal eyes gleaming through the dark.

" _Black?_ " they hissed.

" _I thought they were all dead._ "

" _Do you think she's related to—?_ "

" _She has to be_ —."

" _He was the last one alive—_."

" _Madman's daughter—_."

Elara forced herself to walk because she couldn't just _stand_ there. The stool was hard beneath her when she sat and she averted her eyes from the students, allowing McGonagall to drop the Hat over her head, plunging her into darkness.

 _It was only a matter of time before it was discovered_ , Elara thought, miserable. _I wonder if they'll kick me out before the end of the week._

" _I wouldn't be so sure. We're not accustomed to judging children by the sins of their fathers here at Hogwarts_."

The sly voice speaking in Elara's ear spooked her, but she remained still, terrified.

" _You're not mad. I'm just the Sorting Hat!_ "

 _Oh,_ Elara thought. _Oh, how stupid of me—_.

" _You've a sharp mind_ ," the Sorting Hat said, cutting off her self-effacing comments. " _But the joy of learning for learning's sake has been stripped from you, hasn't it? My, what wretched things some people are capable of. You haven't the heart for Hufflepuff, too brittle now for kindness, a breath away from shattering—_."

Elara flamed at the idea of being _brittle_. Nearby, a goblet shattered and a professor complained. The Hat chuckled.

" _Yes, yes, I can see all that in your head, you know. It doesn't sit well with you, weakness. Your pride, your desire to reclaim identity from the travesties your family has committed—oh yes. I'll send you on to achieve your goals. Better be,_ SLYTHERIN!"

 **xXxXx**

Hermione forced her foot to stop tapping and told herself to calm down, only for her foot to disobey and start tapping again.

 _A dreadful habit_ , her mother called it. _It's very pushy, dear_.

Hermione hated being called _pushy_.

"Granger, Hermione!"

She saw Malfoy sneer from the corner of her eye where he stood with his mountainous friends. Behind her, Harriet whispered "Good luck!" and Hermione felt lighter, fighting not to smile like a loon as she came forward to take her place. A friend. Harriet was a friend, wasn't she? Hermione had never had one before.

The Hat came down over eyes and blacked out the world.

" _Hmm..._ " muttered a small voice. " _I sense you'll be a challenge, girl. You don't live life in half-measures, do you? Nerve and cunning, loyalty and wit—but what shines above the rest?_ "

A rush of thoughts went through Hermione's head, a whirlwind of questions and ideas, things she wanted to ask the Hat and things she wanted to research later. What kind of magic could be put in a bit of cloth to make it read someone's mind? That sounded like the rare, inexplicable things Hermione wanted to understand and master.

" _I'm not just any bit of cloth_ ," the Hat countered. " _There's ambition in you—great, great ambition. You want to be the greatest witch of your age? Well I know just where to put you—_."

 _No,_ Hermione suddenly thought, swallowing. _No, not Slytherin_.

" _Not Slytherin? Why ever not?_ "

Images of Draco filled her head, of Mr and Mrs Malfoy, of their scornful faces and passive aggressive moods. _Mudbloods don't go to Slytherin_ , Draco had said. _You'd best stay with the rest of the duffers!_

Then she remembered that girl, Elara, and what she said on the train. " _That's a bit silly, allowing one person to sully an entire House for you_."

" _She's right, you know_ ," the Hat commented. " _I see it all here, in your head. You want to be more than witty or brave or hardworking. Slytherin will lead you to greatness—but not if you let the actions of someone else hold you back. A boy's words can be cruel, a man's actions crueler, yet they only have power if you allow yourself to be swayed by it._ "

Hermione didn't want to be held back, didn't want to be _swayed_. No, she'd left behind too much, had sworn she'd _do_ too much, to be hampered by the likes of Draco Malfoy. If Slytherin would help her be great and take her to the top of her ability, then Hermione wasn't going to let him take that from her.

" _Better be_ —SLYTHERIN!"

 **xXxXx**

"Longbottom, Neville!"

He was used to the muttering, of course. Used to the crying and the whispering and the incessant handshaking, had kissed his fair share of babies and had signed his name so many times his signature looked like it belonged to someone twice his age. He'd gotten used to it all a long time ago. He couldn't remember a time when that cocky grin and quick wink hadn't been an instant reaction for him.

Sometimes Neville really hated himself.

 _The Boy Who Lived_. Really, Neville wasn't one to complain; he got to travel all over the world, train with some of the best wizards in their fields, meet interesting people. He didn't know how he'd done it, but something in him had killed Voldemort, hadn't it? He wanted to find that, make it the best it could be. The crowds could get frustrating, though. The touching, the role modeling.

Neville wondered what his life would be like if Voldemort hadn't hunted his family down. He wondered what would have happened had both his parents died; Grandma Augusta and Great Uncle Algie could be real ball-busters, and Neville didn't want to imagine what life would be like with them full-time.

The Hat came down on his head and he thought, _Gryffindor_.

The Hat said, " _You'd do well in Hufflepuff. Your life is built on falsity. The House of Badgers would help you heal._ "

But Neville wasn't listening. He rarely listened to anything he didn't want to hear. _Gryffindor_ , he thought again.

And so the Hat sighed. " _Better be—_ GRYFFINDOR!"

The table of crimson and gold exploded.

 **xXxXx**

"Malfoy, Draco!"

He could barely hear his own name over the wretched sound of the Gryffindors cheering. _Bloody Longbottom_ , Draco seethed as he marched to the dais and the waiting stool. _Longbottom the Loser_.

Draco knew exactly what he wanted. There had never been a question in his mind or in his heart; he would make his mother and father _proud_. He wouldn't be outdone by stupid Mudbloods or blood-traitors or gits like Longbottom. He was a Malfoy! He was a _Slytherin._ He had always been a Slytherin.

The Hat knew it, too, because the mangy things barely brushed Draco's hair before screaming—

"SLYTHERIN!"

 **xXxXx**

There weren't many people left and Harriet swallowed her nerves, thinking of all the dreadful hypothetical things that could occur once she took her place on the stool. Had anyone ever been denied entrance? Harriet was sure if it was at all possible it would happen to her.

"Potter, Harriet!"

The Great Hall still rang with excitement over Neville Longbottom's Sorting, so hardly anyone heard Harriet's name being called, and fewer cared. A pale, dark-haired professor at the far end of the staff table stiffened, and the Headmaster in all his aged splendor gave an encouraging smile as Harriet slipped to the front of the scant group. Taking a deep breath, she adjusted her glasses and mounted the dais.

Professor McGonagall smiled slightly as Harriet sat—and the girl prayed to whatever deity listened to ragamuffin witchy runaways that Livi didn't suddenly decide to come slithering out of her clothes. That would be embarrassing, and hard to explain.

The Hat almost swallowed Harriet's head when it came down, and she held her breath.

" _Well, well…isn't that curious_."

 _What's curious_? Harriet asked, because of all the odd things that had occurred in her life, a hat that could talk in her head wasn't too terribly surprising.

" _You're curious, Miss Potter. Everything in your head_."

 _I'm weird, aren't I?_ she thought with a dejected sigh. _I'm a fr—_. No, she wouldn't say that word, wouldn't even think it, because the Dursleys were hundreds of miles away and Harriet would never have anything to with them again. She didn't need them. She could survive on her own.

The Hat chuckled. " _You DO sound a great deal like a Gryffindor. I wonder, though…._ "

 _Gryffindor?_ She shifted the Hat's brim to peek over at the House in question, at the students still clamoring to get a good look at the Boy Who Lived now trimmed in red and gold. She looked at Neville and resentment smoldered in her gut, just waiting for a fresh blast of air to leap into an inferno. The boy who got to keep his family. The boy who got fame and probably a legion of friends. Harriet doubted _he_ had to live in a cupboard after his mum died. The bold and brave found homes in Gryffindor—but Harriet felt neither bold, nor brave. She felt petty and foolish. She wasn't worthy of Gryffindor, not really. She wanted to prove herself better than she was, better than that sharp sting in the back of her eyes. Harriet wanted to go where she could make her parents proud of the witch she would become.

" _Not Gryffindor, eh? Better be—_ SLYTHERIN!"

Harriet rose, heart pounding, and all but yanked the Hat off of her head. She handed it to Professor McGonagall with a quiet word of thanks and rushed off the dais. She plopped onto the first seat she could find, which just so happened to be between Elara and a fifth year Slytherin who would later introduced herself as Gemma Farley. Sitting across the table, Hermione grinned at Harriet.

Elara had gone quite pale and only nodded meekly at Harriet's greeting.

The Sorting came to an end after Weasley—who Malfoy had sneered at in the entrance hall—went to Gryffindor and Blaise Zabini came to Slytherin. Professor McGonagall rolled up her list, picked up the stool and the Hat, and proceeded out of the Great Hall. The Headmaster— _Dumbledore_ , Harriet reminded herself, thinking back to the header on her Hogwarts letter—stood, the voluminous material of his crimson robes rippling like fire when he raised his left hand for silence. Something strange occurred to Harriet as Dumbledore smiled.

"Gemma," she asked in a soft voice. "Does the Headmaster—is he missing an arm?"

The older girl glanced in Dumbledore's direction but no shock showed in her expression. "Yes. Happened before I came to Hogwarts, so he's been like that for awhile."

The wizard's warm voice rose above the chatter. "Excellent! It is wonderful to see you all again—or to see you for the first time." The Headmaster winked behind his half-moon spectacles. "Welcome to Hogwarts! Before we feast, please allow me these few words….Nitwit! Oddment! Blubber! Tweak! Thank you!"

"And yes," Gemma gamely said when Harriet's mouth popped open. Dumbledore sat down. "He is a bit mad."

Harriet giggled and food appeared on the table—great platters and tureens of it, acres of edibles Harriet had only ever sniffed from afar while living with the Dursleys. Her month in the Wizarding quarter, however, had taught Harriet a love for potatoes and gravy, which she ladled onto her plate with unfettered relish. Elara eyed her as Harriet started building a volcano-esque mound and substituting lava with hot, delicious gravy, then snorted.

"Harriet, you really shouldn't play with your food," Hermione said, her tone uncertain.

"I'm not playing with it," Harriet assured her. "I'm going to eat it. Watch." She did just that.

" _Ssss…._ " Dry scales rubbed against Harriet's skin as Livi, roused by the smell of food, poked his head out through the collar of her robes and almost caused Harriet to dump pumpkin juice in Elara's lamp. She had forgotten, of course, that the snake was invisible. " _I want sssome of that, Misstresss._ "

" _Which?_ " she asked under her breath, covering her mouth with her napkin.

" _The dead thing before you. It sssmellss delicciousss._ "

'The death thing' was apparently a whole roast beef, which Harriet discreetly sliced the proper sized piece off of to secret away into her napkin, which she laid open on her lap beneath the table so Livi could eat. Normal snakes had particular dietary needs, but she'd learned from her textbooks that Horned Serpents and other magical snakes were freer in their restrictions, as long as they got the proper nutrients. Livi scarfed down his selection and Harriet disguised his pleased hissing with a cough.

She let her attention wander around the Hall, traversing the walls, the columns, up toward the ceiling enchanted to look like the sky, then down along the High Table. The professors ate their food and chatted with one another, each of them more different than the last; the giant sat at one end next to a tiny wizard who could only be as tall as Harriet's waist, and a woman reminiscent of great glittering dragonfly rambled on to stern and oblivious Professor McGonagall. Headmaster Dumbledore said something to Professor McGonagall with a slight wave of his hand and her lips went so thin they almost disappeared. A younger man in a purple turban flinched so hard when addressed he spilled chutney into his lap.

At the other end of the table, the wizards sat without conversation, quiet and dour as they ate or picked at their plates—and they were all wizards. The man Professor McGonagall had addressed as "Otho" at the castle's doors occupied the last seat, having slipped in through a side door with the giant earlier. His mouth moved with silent mutterings as he viciously stabbed his pork cutlet and hacked off a piece.

Next to him was a taller, gaunt wizard with pale skin and a prominent nose. Harriet was forcibly reminded of the dated scary movies Dudley would watch on the telly when Aunt Petunia wasn't home; he seemed shaded in monochrome, with his stark skin, the curtain of black hair coming down to his shoulders, and eyes as black as the deepest, hungriest pits in the earth. Harriet knew that because she sat near enough for their gazes to briefly meet. His face hardened before he looked away.

They last professor didn't look old enough to _be_ a professor. He appeared barely any older than the eldest students chattering in the halls and was quite handsome, the symmetry of his features really quite striking in Harriet's opinion—but something of the young wizard didn't sit _right_ with her, like a voice murmuring in her ear that she couldn't _quite_ understand, no matter how she tried to listen. His tidy hair gleamed in the candlelight and so did his white teeth when he smiled at the Slytherin table.

Harriet suddenly thought about sharks swimming in the darkest parts of the ocean.

"Gemma," she asked again, the older girl glancing down. "Who are those professors sitting closest to us?"

Gemma didn't need to check who Harriet meant. "Those would be the Slytherin professors. At the end there with the light hair, that's Professor Selwyn. He teaches History of Magic. On his left is Professor Snape, the Potions Master, and on _his_ left is our Head of House, Professor Slytherin."

"Slytherin?" Harriet parroted. "Did they name the House after him?" But no, that couldn't be right. Harriet knew that from _Hogwarts: A History_ —and from the glare Hermione threw across the table. Gemma rolled her eyes.

"No. He's descended from Salazar Slytherin, the House founder."

"Oh. That's, er, interesting."

Dessert was served and though Harriet thought she was stuffed from dinner, she promptly ate far too much ice cream and decided that if they weren't dismissed soon, she might just fall asleep and spend the night right there at the table. She could use a treacle tart as a pillow. Her plans came to naught when the Headmaster stood again and the platters of sweets vanished without a trace.

"Another wonderful feast! Before you're seen off to your dormitories and comfortable beds, I must reiterate a few start-of-term policies. The Forbidden Forest on the grounds is, as its name would suggest, _forbidden_." Dumbledore chuckled. "As is magic in the corridors between classes, and all joke products purchased from the fine establishments of Gambols and Japes, and Zonko's. The first Hogsmeade trip for third years and above is scheduled to be in December, and Quidditch trials will be held next week for the respective House teams. Please contact Madam Hooch with any questions. At last, I would inform you that the third-floor corridor on the right-hand side is out of bounds and trespassing will result in a very painful death."

Sleepy Harriet blinked. _Did I just hear him right?_

"Bloody hell," someone farther down the table whispered.

Professor Slytherin continued to smile. Dumbledore seemed to look everywhere but at him.

"Now! Off to bed! Here's to wishing us all a fun and fulfilling term. You've much learning ahead of you all!"

Older kids titled "Prefects" gathered the first years and the student body departed en masse, the resulting babble of noise and jostling bodies doing little to wake Harriet. She felt a hand on her elbow and looked about to see Elara guiding her from the paths of bigger students who probably didn't even notice they were about to trod on poor short Harriet. Half the school departed in the entrance hall, climbing the sweeping marble steps to the floors above, and the other half took the stairs leading down. The group split again, and the Slytherins delved deeper and deeper, the light disappearing at their backs, torches wavering in shades of yellow and green and blue, the air crisp and heavy in their lungs.

Harriet couldn't remember the common room. In fact, had anyone asked how she got there in the first place, she couldn't have told them. All she recalled were floating orbs of emerald light and towering windows that looked out upon the black tide. Harriet laid down, felt blankets shift higher until they covered her and Livi, and heard the water sigh. She dreamt she was a Galleon tucked in a chest that had sunk to the very bottom of the ocean. She listened to the sea and when the hand came to scratch at the chest's lid, demanding to be let in, she rolled over in her bed of treasure and ignored it.

 **A/N: I imagine there's less than 300 students at Hogwarts in this AU, closer to 200, what with the MPA implemented. Rowling once stated that she considered Hogwarts to have a thousand students, but she wrote it in such a way that it'd be impossible to have that many students. The professors would have ran themselves absolutely ragged without any adjuncts, associates, or assistants.**


	14. house of serpents

_**xiv. house of serpents**_

Hermione woke to the sound of groggy cursing.

For the briefest of moments, she thought she was at home— _home_ , as in _not_ with the Malfoys but snuggly tucked into her bed in her Muggle house surrounded by her books with the smell of pancakes drifting down the hall from the kitchen. Then Hermione remembered the train ride, the lake, the Sorting and the feast. She sat up and reached out to jerk the jade hangings aside.

Dark still encumbered the first-year girls' dormitory, though morning light filtering through the lake outside the windows illuminated the ticking clock set above the student carrells. Hermione squinted at the clock and saw that while early, it was almost time to get up. Harriet knelt on the stone floor by the bed next to Hermione's, hissing underneath of it for some unfathomable reason.

"Harriet!" Hermione said, and the other girl jumped, banging her head on the bed's rail.

" _Bloody_ hell—."

"Harriet!" Hermione said again, chiding. "Really. What _are_ you doing?"

"Oh, er, nothing." Rubbing her head, the girl straightened the bed's skirt until it lay flat once more. Hermione narrowed her eyes when she thought she saw the cover move, wondering if she should say anything. Was Harriet hiding something? What if it got the rest of her dorm mates in trouble? Hermione had been at Hogwarts for less than a day and she did _not_ want to be in trouble!

Then she looked into Harriet's smiling face and she bit her tongue, swallowing the building lecture. _Right. Don't be bossy. Don't be too much. I'm sure it's nothing._

"Morning, Hermione!" Harriet chirped. She still wore her clothes from the day before, robes wrinkled beyond salvaging, her thin face marked where her glasses must have pressed into the skin. Elara had deposited the exhausted girl in her bed last night, stopping only to remove her shoes and jerk the covers over Harriet. With the collar of Harriet's shirt stretched and displaced, Hermione could plainly see the rather ghastly scar that originated from her right shoulder. Of course, Hermione didn't _mention_ the scar to Harriet, thinking the other wouldn't like having the old injury pointed out in casual conversation. Hermione did wonder how she'd gotten it, though.

"Good morning. You're up early. Are you excited for classes?"

"Yeah," Harriet agreed with a nod. "You?"

"Definitely. Gemma said we get out timetables at breakfast, didn't she—?"

A groan emanated from behind the curtains two beds over. "Will you two be _quiet_?"

 _That's Daphne Greengrass_ , Hermione told herself, summoning in her mind the sheet of pure-blood families she'd had to study. _From the Noble House of Greengrass._ The eight beds were arranged in a line against one wall, the carrells on the opposing one, and Hermione had been the bed second closest to the door, with Tracey Davis first. _Davis. That wasn't one of the families Mr Malfoy had me study, but I don't think she's Muggle-born like me._

Harriet— _from the Noble House of Potter, why does she seem so much like a Muggle-born?—_ had the third bed, and Elara Black the fourth. _Black. Noble and Most Ancient House of Black. Mr Malfoy said it was only extant in the female line, but he also said Mrs Malfoy was the last free member of the family? Odd._ Hermione would ask if Elara really was from the House of Black and not, say, a Muggle-born with a fortuitous surname, but she doubted the quiet girl would answer.

She gathered her things for the shared bath and Harriet joined her, wrangling a clean uniform out from her ancient trunk. When Hermione asked her about it, Harriet said, "It belongs to my family." Her green eyes were bright behind her glasses. "It's really nifty, too."

Hermione made quick use of the showers and dressed behind the divider before returning to the dormitory. She was at the room's threshold, mind full of her perspective classes and which text books she might need—when she almost collided with someone. Hermione started to apologize, then they knocked her folded pajamas out of her hands. Hermione ground her teeth as she met the gaze of Pansy Parkinson, of the Most Noble House of Parkinson.

"Watch where you're going, _Granger_ ," Pansy sneered, wrinkling her short nose. Pansy had a hard-face framed by short brown hair and pricey stud earrings pierced her ears, diamonds glittering on her lobes. Millicent Bulstrode standing behind her was a solidly built girl with dark hair and an unfriendly expression— _from the Ex-House of Bulstrode,_ Hermione's brain supplied without prompting. She remembered the genteel snickering of the Malfoys as they discussed the fallen fortune of the once Noble House.

"I already said sorry," Hermione snapped, picking her things up. She'd met Pansy briefly over the summer when the other girl had come to visit Draco, and she'd sneered at Hermione then, too.

"So tell me—," Pansy continued. "How _did_ you make it into Slytherin? I was under the impression Mudbloods weren't allowed in. How does one go about bribing a _hat_?"

Hermione straightened her spine as she met Pansy's gaze again. She was used to bullies. There had been boys in primary who'd loved knocked her things off her desk and they once threw her bag in a pond because she was _too 'bossy_.' "Your _impression_ is wrong. Plenty of Muggle-borns have come through Slytherin before. I didn't have to bribe the Hat. Did you?"

Pansy went to rebuke Hermione, when somebody else coming out of the dormitory spoke. "You're blocking the door."

Elara was an inch or so taller than Millicent, which made her several inches taller than Hermione or Pansy and a whole head higher than Harriet, who had come up behind Hermione with her wild hair tamped down with water. Elara's face was elegant but tired, black smudges under her colorless eyes, her temper visibly thin, and Hermione guessed she was _not_ a morning person. Pansy gave Elara a look that clearly conveyed her displeasure but kept her mouth shut, because she _couldn't_ say anything rude to her. The House of Black was above the House of Parkinson—was above most everyone, really. _Their pseudo-feudal system is both terribly archaic and utterly fascinating_.

Pansy stepped back. Elara scoffed as she entered the bathroom, and Hermione made good on her escape.

xXxXx

The first day of classes proved as exciting as promised.

The Slytherins spent the morning outside the castle, in one of the many greenhouses dotting the grounds, joined by the Ravenclaws and a plump, earthy witch who introduced herself as Professor Sprout. Hermione and a few Ravenclaws took feverish notes, journal popped on their arms, as they stood between muddy planters and the Head of Hufflepuff introduced to all manner of mystical flora and fungi, most of which moved or bit, could poison, stun, or kill the unwary. Most wore wary expressions when Professor Sprout asked for volunteers, so Harriet was the first to raise her hand, jumping in with both sleeves rolled up. Elara Black later managed to kill her own plant seemingly by touching it and lost Slytherin five points.

Expectations ran thick as they made their way to Charms after that, holding their wands in their hands, itching for a chance to use them. Hermione's was yellowish in color, made from vine wood, excellent for those who sought a great purpose—according to Ollivander, at least. Pansy and Katherine Runcorn—the final first year Slytherin girl—both had elm wands and said they made for the _best_ pure-blood wands. Draco didn't like that and he sniffed a he informed them that hawthorn wands were obviously the greater choice.

Harriet got quite vague when Hermione asked about the pale wood of her wand. It was only later that Hermione realized she never got an answer out of her.

After Charms with Professor Flitwick—which only had theoretical studies on the first day—came lunch, then History of Magic with the Hufflepuffs, taught by Professor Otho Selwyn. Hermione knew of him, of course, because he was one of the final living members of the Noble and Ancient House of Selwyn, a family that hotly contested they'd been in Great Britain longer than the Blacks. Professor Selwyn didn't appear to very much want to _be_ a professor, as he spent the first half hour of class muttering about children who didn't know anything about history or magic or the world in general. He scowled with ferocity at the Hufflepuffs—and Hermione.

Their last class of the day was Transfiguration, taught by the stern Head of Gryffindor, Professor McGonagall. Hermione had read all about Transfiguration, of course, and _loved_ how very complex this particular branch of magic was. She had to suppress the urge to laugh when the others babbled in the corridor on the way there, excited to jump right in, when Hermione knew they wouldn't touch anything even remotely difficult until they had practiced and studied Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfiguration. She had dozens of questions written in a notebook already and hoped the older witch had open office hours.

Professor McGonagall passed out a match each with instructions to turn the matches into silver needles. Hermione felt quite smug indeed when she alone fully managed the feat, earning _ten_ points for Slytherin and a warming smile from the strict professor.

Then Harriet somehow managed to turn her match into a short wooden javelin.

"Miss Potter, what _are_ you doing over here?"

"Er…."

Many of the other Slytherins were torn between being elated about the points or glaring at Hermione. She really hoped their antagonism would pass. Logically, the antipathy pure-bloods showed toward Muggle-borns _didn't_ make sense. They had emotional bonds to their family heritage Hermione understood, but wasn't magic _magic_? She'd read some absolute tosh about how Muggle-borns stole pure-blood magic—but Hermione had found nothing _credible_ that said the ability of Muggle-borns or half-bloods was any less than a pure-blood's!

 _But what do you know, really?_ A sharp, cold voice in the back of her mind demanded. It had always been there, but lately it had begun to sound more and more like Lucius Malfoy. _An entire world of magic existed without you having a clue. You know so little._

Hermione wondered if she'd made a mistake in letting the Hat place her in Slytherin. She fretted over the decision. Oh, she had ambition in spades, but she wasn't—wasn't _cunning_ , wasn't sneaky or subtle or traditional. She passed the perfect needle from hand to hand and sighed. The House of Serpents was home to people like Draco Malfoy and Pansy Parkinson. Could it be home to someone like Hermione, too?

"Father says Mudbloods are _always_ thirsty for attention," Draco said to Goyle once Professor McGonagall moved away. "He says you have to watch how much you feed them or they'll forget their place—ow!"

Harriet's javelin slid off her desk and landed on Draco's foot. Given the thunk it made, Hermione guessed it was solid wood.

"Oh, I'm so sorry, Malfoy," Harriet said in a flat voice, twiddling with her wand. The pointy faced boy turned an unattractive red. "I'm just so _clumsy_."

Then Harriet winked.

Hermione covered her mouth to hide her smile.

 **A/N: Set basically handed Harriet a stick of dynamite instead of a sparkler, so there'll be repercussions—good, bad, and probably hilarious. Harriet, Hermione, and Elara will each have their own strengths, weaknesses, and interests in classes.**


	15. professor tom

_**xv. professor tom**_

Harriet was _not_ looking forward to Defense Against the Dark Arts.

Her first day of classes had been amazing—up until Transfiguration, when Harriet had taken her wand out for the first time with the intent of using it and had transformed her match into a bloody javelin. Professor McGonagall told her to stay after class, then demanded to know which spell Harriet had been using. Harriet tried the spell again on another match at the professor's insistence—and, in her panicked rush, managed to make an even bigger javelin that almost toppled McGonagall's desk.

The professor gave her a very strange look as she told Harriet to practice her control.

" _Control_ ," Hermione told Harriet later while they were sitting in the common room by one of the windows, their homework spread out on the table between them. A strange fish kept making rude faces at them through the glass. " _Refers to the amount of magic you funnel into a spell and how you mitigate it_."

Harriet had no idea what that meant, but decided she'd best practice before she turned a house cat into a tiger and got one of her classmates mauled.

"Still working on that match?" Elara asked at breakfast the next day. The other girl watched Harriet drown her toast in syrup and seemed to find Harriet's almost overt enjoyment of the food at Hogwarts amusing.

"Yeah," Harriet glumly admitted, poking her sticky toast. "If you find a bunch of stakes in the common room's broom closet—they're not mine."

Elara smiled—well, the corner of her mouth twitched. Across the table, Hermione had her nose buried in the Herbology textbook, and three seats down Pansy was waxing on and on to a bored Daphne about her new necklace and how exceedingly expensive it was. She reminded Harriet of Aunt Petunia, always chatting up the neighbors, making sure they knew just how much the Dursleys spent on their car or their house or their clothes. Harriet imagined what Pansy would say if she told her she sounded like a Muggle, then snorted.

The owl post arrived with a flurry of feathered wings, the birds slipping in through the open slots in the Great Hall's eaves, seeming to plunge right out of the sky itself. Two owls dropped a crate of home goods in front of Malfoy and he crowed with delight. Elara's terrifying horned owl came swooping in and scattered the smaller post deliverers, startling some of the students with his baleful glare. Unperturbed, Elara stroked his head, tied a letter to his leg, and sent the creature on his way.

"Have you managed it, then?" Harriet asked. In response, Elara retrieved her journal from her school bag and cracked it open, revealing the horrid handwriting inside—as well as a few perfect silver needles tucked safely in the binding. Harriet pouted and scratched at Livi's belly beneath her vest. The serpent disliked remaining behind in the dorm and she hadn't been able to convince him to stay today.

"My…Uncle Cygnus taught me a little about control," Elara said, her tone careful, her eyes on the journal rather than Harriet. "To help mitigate…accidents. He says you can feel your magic like shouting."

"Like _shouting?_ "

"Yes. He said it's similar to the feeling of pulling air into your lungs, how the muscles in your chest constrict and how your vocal cords vibrate to increase pitch. He told me that, if you concentrate, you can sense your magic doing something similar just before you cast a spell."

That sounded complicated to Harriet, but she tucked the information away, nodding her head. "Thanks, Elara."

"You're welcome."

They had Herbology again after breakfast which, ironically, Harriet found quite relaxing. She hated toiling Aunt Petunia's garden where she had to clip, trim, bind, and battle the wildness of nature into something her relatives deemed respectable, but Herbology wasn't like that. Caring for magical plants meant learning and understanding their oddities, letting them flourish any way they wanted, not in ways deemed "proper." Harriet earned points for Slytherin—which proved a good thing, because Elara kept losing them, muttering " _it's the roses all over again_ " under her breath.

The bell rang and Harriet's dread rose. It was time for Defense.

"You needn't be so nervous," Hermione told her as they reentered the castle and made for one of the many staircases. Harriet had a wretched sense of direction and Hermione had mapped out three different routes to every class, so Harriet stuck to her friend's side like a limpet. "It's not as if you're going to set someone on fire or something."

Harriet quickly buried the memory of setting Uncle Vernon's trousers alight and prayed they wouldn't have a repeat performance today.

Voices in the corridor outside the classroom alerted them to the presence of the Gryffindors, the only House the Slytherins hadn't had a class with yet. Harriet only counted nine students wearing gold and crimson trimmed robes, which made their year considerably smaller than Slytherin at thirteen—most of which were girls. Longbottom more than made up for their lack of bodies however, as older students crossing the hall had to stop and stare at the boy, and voices around him swelled to almost intolerable levels.

"Must be difficult, Longbottom," Malfoy drawled, facing the Gryffindors across corridor. The door to the class was shut tight. "Trying to fit your fat head in the castle."

Goyle and Crabbe guffawed. Longbottom didn't react; his eyes flickered in Malfoy's direction, then tipped away as if Draco simply wasn't worth his time. Harriet thought living as a celebrity had probably thickened his skin—but that wasn't the case for Ron, who flushed red from his ears to his freckled cheeks.

"Shut up, Malfoy."

"Or what, _Weasel_?"

Before they could find out "what" Ron had in mind, the door popped open in wordless invitation. Hermione—ignoring the unbecoming behavior of her fellows—was the first through the entrance, and Harriet hurried in after her.

The Defense classroom had to be the largest of all the classrooms, though Harriet hadn't been to Potions or Astronomy yet. A wide aisle split the room's middle, the desks scattered on either side, and a small platform with a lectern dominated the front instead of a desk. The guttering torchlight cast shadows through the bones of the preserved creatures crowding the various display cabinets. Each of the soaring windows was shuttered closed.

"Take your seats." Slytherin's Head of House stood shy of the halo thrown by the nearest torch and his outline seemed strangely blurred against the dim backdrop—but then he stepped forward, black robes rippling, and the illusion dissipated. He had his wand in hand, texts tucked under an arm. "Quickly."

Hermione took one of the seats in the very front. Harriet wanted to sit next to her, but she felt increasingly uneasy, so she sat behind her next to Elara and Blaise Zabini. One side of the aisle had exactly thirteen seats and the other nine; a natural division was drawn between the Gryffindors and the Slytherins, the House of Lions drifting as far from Harriet's dorm mates as they could.

"You do not need your textbooks in my classroom," the professor said—and Harriet saw Hermione's hands stop before they could fully open her bag. "I have no patience for watching children _read_."

A few Slytherins chortled.

The professor's robes swept the ground as he stepped onto the platform and came to the lectern, flashes of emerald-green embroidery shifting on the hem like scales under a roiling tide. He set his books atop the lectern, then looked over the room like a king viewing his less than exemplary kingdom and Harriet _still_ couldn't believe someone as young as him was a teacher. "Good morning, Slytherins…and Gryffindors." He added the latter in afterthought. "I am Professor Slytherin—yes, direct descendant of Salazar Slytherin himself, Head of his House, and your Defense Against the Dark Arts instructor." Professor Slytherin inclined his head and stepped off the platform, slowly pacing the aisle as he continued.

"Who here can define the Dark Arts for us?"

Hermione's hand shot up into the air.

"Name?" Professor Slytherin asked in a lazy drawl.

"Hermione Granger, sir."

"Tell us then, Granger, how you would define the Dark Arts."

"The Dark Arts are a magic that intends harm to those it is cast upon."

Slytherin shrugged a shoulder. "A prosaic answer," he replied, and Harriet saw Hermione's back stiffen. "But one that proves you reviewed the material before coming to my class. A point to Slytherin." He gave a languorous turn and paced the room again, wand still braced between his hands, index finger balanced on the tip. "There are seven distinct branches of magic: Transfiguration, Charms, Jinxes, Hexes, Curses, Counter-spells, and Healing-spells, each school with its own variations, disciplines, and cross-sections. The Dark Arts comprise _all_ branches of magic, and though our vaunted Headmaster may disagree in my definition, you will cast many Dark spells in all of your classes during your years at Hogwarts."

"Hogwarts doesn't teach Dark magic," one of Gryffindors argued—Seamus, Harriet thought his name might be. "Me Mam told me Professor Dumbledore banned the lot of it when he took over."

Professor Slytherin paused, head swiveling to fix Seamus with a pointed look. The position finally brought his face directly into the light, and Harriet realized the wizard's eyes were _red_ , as red as Uncle Vernon's face when Harriet had _really_ messed up, red as the lining on the Gryffindors' robes, red as _blood_ —

A sudden prickling stole through Harriet's neck and she scratched at it, lowering her head when the professor's gaze swiveled over the Slytherins, his brow furrowed.

"Your name?" he asked when he turned to the Gryffindors again.

"Seamus Finnigan."

" _Sir_. You will address me as ' _sir_ ' or ' _professor_ ' or ' _my Lord_ ' if you're feeling particularly proper; I am, after all, Lord to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Slytherin." He smiled and it was _not_ a nice expression. "Tell me, Finnigan; where _did_ your ' _mam_ ' receive her mastery?"

"S-sir?"

" _Where_ did your _mother_ receive her mastery in _Defense Against the Dark Arts_ , Finnigan?" The sentence rolled off his tongue dripping disdain and he leaned nearer the paling Gryffindor boy. Harriet shivered and Seamus looked too terrified to answer. "I will take your silence to mean 'Oh, Professor Slytherin, my mother never achieved mastery in Defense. Please do excuse my worthless interruption about the opinions of my ignorant family members. We should obviously take _your_ opinions and advice far more seriously.'" Slytherin straightened and his face lost its mocking smile. Seamus trembled. "Five points from Gryffindor."

The professor returned to the head of the aisle and when he faced the class again, his expression was once more relaxed, almost approachable. Almost. "I do believe that's enough introduction. Let's do something practical, shall we? I will teach you the most basic of protection spells: the Shield Charm. Wands out!"

Harriet's nerves from earlier returned as she retrieved her wand from her brace, noticing many of the others had theirs simply stuffed into robe or pants pockets. Livi hissed something but Harriet didn't catch what he said.

"Now, the spell is simple enough. Copy my pronunciation and movements." Professor Slytherin lifted his wand, then brought his hand down in a slow, slicing motion, saying, " _Protego._ "

The class mimicked him.

"Again."

They repeated this three time before the professor seemed mollified. Harriet wouldn't say Slytherin was _satisfied_ ; no, indeed, the young wizard wore the most bored expression possible while he led the first years through their paces. Satisfaction was far from his mind. "Enough. We'll see if you've managed it….ah, yes, Mr _Longbottom_. How about a demonstration? I'm told you've trained with some of the very _best_ in the field." The way he said " _best"_ conveyed Slytherin's clear dismissal of others' prowess in his subject.

Neville simply stood, shrugging. Professor Slytherin flicked his wand at the opposing end of the aisle with a wordless spell and a red lion glowed on the floor. "Your mark, Longbottom. In case you get lost."

Several Slytherins snickered.

Holding his wand tight, Longbottom made his way to the lion and stood on it, his face set in a determined glare as he met Professor Slytherin's gaze. This amused the wizard. "I won't be instructing you in dueling until next year, but it would be beneficial for us to practice proper form, yes? _Bow_ , Longbottom."

Both Neville and the professor dipped their heads and again several Slytherins laughed. Malfoy seemed to be enjoying himself.

"Cast the Charm."

Neville shifted his feet into a better stance as he faced his opponent, his wand steady when he slashed it downward and stated, " _Protego!_ "

The air before him shimmered, milky as a ghost but not as opaque, rumpled at the edges like a sheet left too long in the drier.

Professor Slytherin aimed a flippant jab in Neville's direction. " _Flipendo_."

Nothing happened at first, then— _BANG!_ Blue light flared and Harriet jumped when a girl from Gryffindor shrieked, the force of Professor Slytherin's spell rippling through the floor when it collided with Neville's shield. It held, if only just, Neville's feet sliding several inches along the stone floor until he came to a stop, panting hard. The Gryffindors broke into applause.

"Quiet," Professor Slytherin said, waving Neville back to his seat. "Decent. Though I expected better from someone meant to already _know_ the spell. Five points to Gryffindor. Someone from Slytherin now…you. Name?"

He pointed at Malfoy's tallest friend, the boy with big feet and bristly hair. "Greg Goyle, sir."

"All right, Mr. Goyle. To the mark."

The red lion dissolved into a green snake and Goyle lumbered over to it. He and Slytherin bowed to each other, displaying a touch more respect than Neville had, and the duel repeated itself. This time, however, when Professor Slytherin's spell struck the milky distortion before Goyle, the shield gave wave with an audible sigh and the younger wizard went toppling backward. The other side of the classroom broke into smothered laughter.

"Deplorable. Return to your seat, Goyle." Slytherin rubbed his brow as Goyle stumped over to his chair more disheveled than he'd left it. "Do not mumble when you're casting. _Enunciate_. Let's have one of our witches redeem us, shall we?"

Hermione's hand once more bobbed in the air, but the professor ignored her, surveying the other seven Slytherin girls. Harriet shrunk herself down and stared at the top of her desk, furiously chanting ' _Not me, not me, not me_ ' in her head.

"You." Professor Slytherin tapped Harriet's desk to get her attention and she almost groaned. _Shite_. "Name?"

"H-Harriet Potter, professor."

Recognition whipped through those terrifying eyes, then disappeared. "To the mark, Miss Potter."

Harriet stood and almost tripped over her own bag in her rush, but she staggered upright to the waiting snake with her head held high. Livi tightened himself beneath her clothes and hissed, " _You sssmell of fear_."

" _Shut up_ ," she responded, quietly.

"What was that, Miss Potter?"

"Nothing, sir."

Harriet turned in place and met the watching stares of her classmates. Her face burned. _I can do this_ , she told herself. Slytherin stood at the opposing end of the aisle, waiting, not a hair out of place. _I can do this. What's the worse that could happen? Has anyone ever blown up a professor before? Can you get kicked out for that?_

She mimicked the professor's stance and adjusted her glasses before clenching the hand holding her wand. The strip of wood hummed with excitement beneath her skin. " _Protego_!"

The air swirled and hardened like a thin cloud suddenly freezing in front of Harriet. She braced herself and thought she might feel what Elara had spoken of at breakfast, the sudden warm tension in her chest, the heat whispering down through her arm and out her hand—.

" _Flipendo_."

The blue light cracked against Harriet's shield and, for an instant, she thought she might go flying like Goyle—until the spell suddenly slung itself _back_ at Professor Slytherin. Harriet gaped in horror—and the wizard quickly flicked his wand to divert the returning Jinx, sending it flying over his shoulder, riffling his tidy hair. The class gasped. Slytherin grinned.

Harriet had only a moment to act—. " _Protego!_ "

" _Flipendo_."

The second spell came faster and didn't rebound. Harriet's feet slid like Neville's had, her arm shaking.

" _Flipendo!_ "

" _Protego!_ "

Slytherin's third attempt came quicker still and Harriet's hasty shield warbled until it collapsed in on itself. Harriet landed on her backside with an "Oof!" Livi hissed in displeasure.

"Excellent, Miss Potter," Professor Slytherin said as the members of his House clapped. The Gryffindors didn't applaud. "Take ten points for that demonstration and return to your seat."

She did as instructed, weak-kneed and dazed with her glasses sitting crooked on her nose. The mini-duels continued, most students sent sprawling on the ground like Goyle by their bored professor, others summoning a weak shield that nullified most of the energy in Slytherin's spell but still tripped them up. Hermione and Draco managed to stay standing like Neville—yet no one pulled off the Charm as well as Harriet had.

"How did you do that?" Hermione asked later, miffed, as they gathered their bags and headed to lunch. Harriet didn't know how to answer her. The move had been _instinctive_ , easy. Despite her misgivings and the eeriness of the professor, Harriet thought she might like Defense Against the Dark Arts.

She wished her neck would stop itching, though.


	16. fire burn and cauldron bubble

_**xvi. fire burn and cauldron bubble**_

Severus was convinced he never got around to growing up.

Not really, at any rate. He often reflected on his immaturity, his suspended evolution, when his mind wandered in the dead hours of the morning—a time of day even the ghosts found themselves drifting through with half-closed eyes and weary yawns. Severus was trapped in a limbo of maturation, not unlike those prepubescent dunderheads he taught, the tangle of a half-lived existence that seemed to have no beginning nor end; just endless, spiraling knots. It was the result of spending his life among children, of never leaving Hogwarts—except for those three horrendous years he submitted himself to the thrall of a madman.

Those three years he would spend the rest of his life atoning for.

He was both too old and too young; too old to be a child and too young to be an adult, constantly under the scrutiny of those who taught _him_ while he attended the school, and Severus often felt as if he'd simply exchanged his class schedule for a lesson plan and continued on without a thought. Dumbledore addressed him as " _my dear boy,_ " Minerva chided him to be " _kinder, more empathetic_ ," and Filius still called him " _Mr. Snape_ " on occasion, much to the wizard's chagrin.

Memories blurred and echoed in the castle's unchanging halls. The sensation worsened whenever he crossed paths with the relatives or children of those he went to school with. He'd chastise Jacob Rowle and suddenly remember the boy's father, Thorfinn Rowle, crowing about joining the Dark Lord, telling young Severus he'd "better take care of his Gryffindor bullies, before someone took care of him." He'd grade an essay for a Rosier cousin and remember completing assignments for Evan Rosier, just to be paid Knuts from the pure-blood boy's pocket change.

He'd hear girlish laughter and think of red hair in the sunlight, bright like fresh apples.

He'd see pale eyes and think of a haughty boy now rotting in a cell. _Good riddance_.

The cowardly fear of what nightmares awaited him, unborn until he entered the Potions classroom for his first year Slytherin class, sickened Severus. He didn't want to open the classroom door. _Hell_ no. He wanted to return to his quarters and swill enough Dreamless Sleep to sleep through the next seven years.

 _Seven years_. Merlin, Severus knew he probably wouldn't survive that long.

The door bounced off the stone wall with a clatter when he strolled into the dungeon, startling the first years out of their tentative conversations. Their faces shone ghoulish in the candlelight reflected by the specimen jars and Severus sneered, thrusting his robes aside as he sank onto the chair behind his desk. The first name on the role call lit a fire in his gut and he regretted getting up that fucking morning.

"Elara _Black_."

He wouldn't have believed it if he hadn't seen her with his own eyes, hadn't heard the discreet whispers shared between the others in the staffroom. "His _daughter,"_ they said as if afraid to use the actual name. " _And Marlene's. Poor dear._ " Severus always thought Black had a thing for the werewolf—but there sat evidence to the contrary in the middle of his classroom, a mirror image to the malicious bastard who almost killed Severus in their youth. He met her eyes and heard Black's voice, " _All right there, Snivellus_?"

"Present, sir."

Of course she sat by Lily's daughter. _Of course_.

He dreaded the echoes he would hear when he looked at the girl. Severus had caught a glimpse of that atrocious Potter hair at the Sorting and had looked away—had looked _anywhere_ but at the child he'd sworn on his life to protect. What he hadn't expected, however, was for there to be _no_ echo; Severus glanced at Harriet Potter and realized she only vaguely resembled James or Lily, a palimpsest of two originals blurred to create something other.

She had none of Lily's softness, none of James' arrogance. The girl glanced about at the grim decor with the same tentative curiosity he'd seen Muggles use at crash sites, her expression openly fascinated, but her gaze dark, closed off. Even in the height of war, Lily's eyes had sparked bright as if the witch contained an endless vault of joy in her head she could delve into whenever she wanted—and the girl's eyes reflected none of that.

She was not James, and she was not Lily. She was a girl with hair like a Niffler, eyes like a jackal, and a tie of green and silver cinched about her throat. When the Hat had shouted Slytherin, parts of him rejoiced and parts of him despaired, because he wanted proof that even the _good_ got sent to the snake pit sometimes, but he hadn't wanted that for her. Nothing good could last in Slytherin's hands.

 _They should check to see if Potter is still spinning in his grave_ , Severus thought with a snort. He returned his attention to the list before him, marginally relieved, marginally disappointed, and continued to call names.

"Ah, Neville Longbottom." He flicked the parchment, voice thick with sarcasm. "Of course. The _Boy Who Lived_. It appears, class, our savior has taken leave of his busy traveling schedule to bestow us with his presence. How _remarkable_."

Severus had a role to play. He knew this—and yet it came so easily, as if it wasn't a role at all, Slytherins chortling like their fatuous fucking parents used to do whenever the Dark Lord tortured the "unworthy," and Severus gloried in the vitriol bubbling in his veins like poison. _The Boy Who Lived To Do Fuck All_ , his mind snarled, even as a very small voice murmured, _It's not his fault_. No, no it wasn't Longbottom's fault the world was filled with idiots, but that didn't make it simpler for Severus to swallow. The boy's ignorance chaffed.

Longbottom played poster boy for the Ministry, said, " _The Dark Lord's dead_ ,"and the public cheered, all while men like Severus and Dumbledore knew better. Oh, how they knew better. The Dark Lord was anything _but_ dead.

"Tell me, Longbottom: what would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?"

An unfair question, but a plausible one for a brat like Longbottom, inundated with tutors since he'd first worn swaddling clothes. "I don't know, sir," the boy said with an unaffected shrug.

"No?" Severus replied in a voice barely above a whisper. He rose from his behind his desk, walking slowly between the tables, arms crossed. A deathly hush encumbered the dungeon. "Let's try again, shall we? Where, _Mr_ Longbottom, would you find a bezoar?"

"I don't know."

From the corner of his eye, Severus saw one of the bushy-haired Slytherin girls raise her hand, the motion determined. _Who was she?_ Not a Death Eater's kid, and there'd been only two names on the register that he didn't recognize. _Either Davis or Granger, Lucius' ward_. Severus tipped his dark gaze in her direction and gave his head a definite jerk to the side. Paling, she dropped her arm again.

"Do you even know what a bezoar _is_ , Longbottom?"

"No." Longbottom gave him a peeved look and most of the Gryffindors fumed as Severus belittled their golden scion.

"What is the difference between monkshood and wolfsbane?"

The tension shifted in the boy's round face, his mouth quirking into a grin. "Nothing. They're both the same plant, called aconite."

"My, my," Severus sneered. "One in three. Please forgive if I don't hold my breath for those odds in your marks, Longbottom."

Malfoy laughed loudest. At her table near the front, Severus spotted the Potter girl discreetly flipping through the back of the textbook, terrified of being called on next. He ignored her and Black's spawn sitting at her side.

He didn't know which one the bushy-haired girl at the front table was, so he said, "Granger," aloud, and was rewarded for the lucky guess when she lifted her gaze from her notes. "What is the result of adding powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?"

"The Draught of Living Death, sir."

"Where is a bezoar found?"

"In the stomach of a goat, sir."

"What is it used for?"

"An antidote for most poisons, and several kinds of venom, including those man-made and those that occur naturally—."

Severus cut her off. "Name _one_ potion that uses aconite."

Here she paused and gave his question thought, brow furrowed in concentration. "The—the Wideye Potion, sir?"

"Are you asking me, Miss Granger?"

"No, sir."

"Then you would be correct." He swept past the table toward his desk again. "That'll be ten points to Slytherin…and ten points from Gryffindor."

Minerva's little lions gasped, outraged. Longbottom scoffed and curled his lip. "That's hardly fair, _sir_."

Severus only smiled. "Let me be the first to inform you, Longbottom; life _isn't_ fair."

 **xXxXx**

His hand began to itch as he stood over Longbottom's cauldron and sneered at the contents.

Severus scratched at his palm without thought as he berated the boy and his partner, Weasley, for the globular mess they'd concocted—and for nearly exploding a perfectly simple Cure for Boils by not taking the cauldron from the flames before adding the porcupine quills. He'd caught them in time, if only just, smacking the quills from Weasley's fingers an instant before he'd dumped them into the stew.

Of course, not a moment later, acrid smoke billowed through the dungeon as a cauldron near the front of the room collapsed, and Severus almost swore aloud.

The Potter girl had quick reflexes, as she managed to shove herself and Black aside before the main deluge doused them, though part of her leg was already breaking out in furious boils. Black, wringing her hands, was apologizing profusely to Potter as Severus swept over them and Vanished the botched potion, his temper close to snapping.

"What are you idiots doing?" he hissed in an undertone. The Gryffindors were plainly enjoying their failure and Severus couldn't have that kind of dissension in his dungeon. Gryffindors couldn't leave his class looking _pleased_ , for Merlin's sake. "Did you _not_ just hear me tell off Longbottom and Weasley for almost doing the _same exact thing_?!"

"We took the cauldron off the heat," Black argued, her face red and flustered. Angry as he was, Severus did, in fact, see that the ruin of Potter's cauldron had been lifted from flame and set upon the proper cooling rack so it wouldn't scorch the tabletop. "I was—I was just _stirring_ it, like the instruction said—sir." Her tone corrected itself when she remembered to whom she spoke.

Severus glared at the mess. "You must have not paid attention to the temperature then. _Idiots_." He wasn't sure what'd gone wrong, but in a decade of teaching Potions, Severus had never seen a Cure for Boils combust when someone was "just stirring it _."_ They did something to it, foolish brats.

"Sir?" Potter asked, and Severus forced himself to look down—down all the way at girl he loomed above. Potter was thin; short and thin and fine-boned like a mottled fledgling, not at all like her tall, winsome mother, or James Potter, who had been athletic and statuesque—for all that he was a great ruddy fathead. "Can I go to the infirmary?"

"No," Severus snapped. Ignoring her flabbergasted expression, he pointed his wand toward the storage cupboard and waited, hand extended, until the door banged open and jar of ointment smacked into his palm. "There's no need to bother Madam Pomfrey with something so imbecilic." Severus had no wish for details of this incident to find a home in the _wrong_ ears.

He shoved the medicine at her, then glowered at Black. The contrite expression the girl wore when glancing toward Potter worried him more than any arrogance or malice he might have seen written in her face. With his luck, it would figure the bloody traitor's heir would befriend Lily's daughter. As if Black Senior hadn't done enough to the Potters.

Another problem for another day.

Severus turned then and found every eye in the dungeon upon him. He bore his teeth. "Get back to _work_."

The lesson ended soon afterward, potions divided into slender vials and neatly sorted into the rack waiting on his desk. Severus ordered them to clean their stations but inevitably found himself lingering after the students ran from the dungeon, using his wand to Scourgify the tables, chairs, and floor, repairing knife marks gouged into the wood, muttering darkly over the residual damage wrought by inconsiderate children wielding scalpels and fire and acidic concoctions. Lunch had started by the time he could finally leave.

Which was why Severus wasn't prepared for the voice that came slithering out from the shadows when he opened the classroom door.

"Find any potential among the dregs, Severus?"

Tom Slytherin, he knew, was not _actually_ a Slytherin—no more than Severus was a _Prince_ , or their bigoted Minister a _Gaunt_ , or the Dark Lord named _Voldemort_. He also knew that Slytherin was and was _not_ Tom Riddle, not exactly, and the only person who fully understood how that phenomenon came to pass was Dumbledore himself. Severus had given up questioning the Headmaster on the matter years ago. All that mattered was that no Ministry law in existence, be it old or new, could draw a connection between the seemingly youthful wizard before him and the twisted wretch Severus had served in his youth.

All attempts to oust Slytherin from the school—both bodily and judicially—had been met with the kind of legal fluidity that came from years and years of blackmailing school governors and Ministry officials, whispering the right words into the ears of bylaw creators, watching and waiting with the kind of uncanny patience Severus had never thought possible for the Dark Lord. Albus had tried to duel him and lost his arm. Severus had tried to poison him and lost his eye.

"No," he replied to the shorter wizard stepping into the wavering torchlight. _Tom_ had a sense of melodrama just like the Dark Lord; he always dressed in robes tooled with his House colors, snakes on the hem and silver buttons on the waistcoat. His appearance gave him effortless charm, sharp cheekbones and symmetrical features, tidy hair and a guileless smile. Severus often pondered the number of witches—and wizards—who had been lured to their doom by that young face. "They are as insipid as ever and singularly dull. Though, Nott showed some instinct with the skill."

Had he been speaking to the Minister, he would have put on airs about Lucius' son or the Runcorn girl or Parkinson, but the running tally of _which_ master the Death Eaters served was always shifting, and so he praised Nott Junior—well, as much as Severus ever praised anyone. There was a kind of sick irony in the illusions cast by these men who _were_ and _were not_ Voldemort; in the open, they presented themselves as pure-blood lords of particular talents, and behind closed doors they one and all claimed to be _the_ Dark Lord and demanded submission, leaving the Death Eaters to play a game of confused musical chairs with their loyalty.

"Oh?" Slytherin said, head tipping. "A pity—though you are ruthless in your artistry, aren't you? A few showed promise in Darks Arts." When speaking to Severus or to that churlish bastard Selwyn he referred to the Defense class solely as "Dark Arts." Tom'd been doing so for years, and if that wasn't sign of ominous portents, Severus didn't know what was. "The Potter girl, for instance."

The sudden urge to ram Slytherin's sodding head into the stones scoured through Severus and he would have done so, had he thought it'd do anything. He'd watched the wizard drink a glass of pumpkin juice laced with enough nightshade and aconite to take down an Erumpent without flinching. Slytherin would undoubtedly survive a good head bashing.

"Miss Potter," he said with uncaring ice in his voice. "Is as perfectly average as the rest."

Slytherin just smiled.

 **A/N: Fun fact, but the majority of Harriet's classes would be taught by Slytherins, if you believe the fanon of Professor Sinistra being in Slytherin. I try to avoid repeating canon dialog, especially since we've all most likely read it a million times in different fics, but a few lines are rather iconic. If I use them, I paraphrase.**


	17. what awaits the sin of greed

_**xvii. what awaits the sin of greed**_

Before the students knew what was happening, their first week at Hogwarts had come to an end.

The walls of Number Four, Privet Drive, were once the whole of Harriet's world; the horizon stopped where the drive met the street, the trimmed hedges were her jungle, the cupboard her prison and sanctuary, the kitchen a pseudo-minefield she navigated every single day. With the Dursleys, Harriet didn't dream about a different life, as it was quite difficult to imagine that which you knew nothing about—but she would spend long hours trapped in the cupboard's belly thinking about impossible things; about elves like the ones in her story books, about trees that craved conversation, about motorcycles that roared across the stars.

But, even in her most outlandish thinking, Harriet could have _never_ created something as magical, ridiculous, and wonderful as Hogwarts. The stairs moved and the portraits snoozed, the ghosts seemed to flee Harriet's presence, throwing themselves right through the walls whenever she entered a corridor, and the horizon stretched far, far away, far past the mountains and the lake and the forest filled with terrifying creatures of legend.

She loved her classes, some more than others. Astronomy happened on Wednesday nights, and though seeing all the constellations shine in a sky untouched by electric lights was breathtaking, there was a lot more maths involved than Harriet had been expecting. Transfiguration, too, proved difficult for her, with all its theoretical topics and abstract thinking. The Dursleys had raised Harriet with a rigid way of thinking, and while she liked to believe she'd bucked their influence, that wasn't wholly true. Professor McGonagall would say " _Imagine the beetle becoming a button,_ " and a hateful voice in the back of Harriet's head would sneer " _Beetles don't become buttons_."

Harriet had far more fun in Herbology and Professor Sprout was amused by her willingness to tackle the tasks set out for the day, but her best class was—somehow—Defense Against the Dark Arts. Harriet couldn't explain _why_ , no matter how Hermione badgered her about it. She could only guess that, at their heart, defense spells responded to intuition, instinct—and despite the weight of the Dursleys' grounding heel, Harriet had always been a wild thing who thrived on instinct.

It helped that whenever Professor Slytherin turned his wand on her, Harriet's heart would lurch and she'd suddenly find her own in her hand. Sometimes she swore she spotted Set out of the corner of her eye stretching for the professor, but never quite reaching.

Professor Slytherin was scary—yet not as terrifying as the Potions Master. Professor Snape had the same look as those blokes Harriet sometimes saw heading toward Knockturn Alley; like he was capable of stealing your organs and preserving them in his jars if you weren't paying attention. He towered over them, a black pillar of barely restrained fury, soft voice scantly audible over their bubbling potions. He mostly ignored Harriet—a relief, really—but he seemed to _hate_ Elara and Neville Longbottom. The former he approached with subtle disdain, often snapping at her to leave Harriet's table and sit by herself in the back so she'd stop dousing her fellows in fouled potions. To be fair, Elara did melt an awful lot of cauldrons.

Neville, on the other hand, bore the brunt of the professor's scorn and melted almost as many cauldrons as Elara. Harriet found it hard to sympathize, especially when she'd hear Longbottom whisper how Snape was just a greasy Slytherin no one had or would ever love.

No one ever loved Harriet either, and some days she still blamed the Boy Who Lived for that.

"Harriet!"

She was jerked out of her maudlin thoughts by Hermione's voice and the flat rock in her hand hit the water with a dissatisfying ' _plunk!_ ' "Err—what was that?"

"The First Principle, Harriet," said her friend from her perch on the dry boulder at the shoreline. "What is the First Principle of Gamp's Law?"

"Err," Harriet said again as she nudged the stones underfoot, looking for another worth skipping. She stood ankle deep in the cool water of the lake, as did several other students dotted about the shore, all happy to have a short reprieve from classes. Had Harriet less studious friends, they might have joined her in skipping rocks instead of insisting on quizzing, but Harriet didn't mind. She thought this must be the best way to study and was just glad Hermione wanted to be around her. Elara proved more complicated in comprehending, Harriet torn between calling her a friend or not because sometimes Elara was perfectly friendly and other days she said almost nothing to her. Harriet didn't understand but, really, Harriet understood very little about people.

"It's about food," Hermione hinted, tapping the open text spread on her lap.

"Oh. Um, it says that…you can't conjure food out of nothing, right?" Harriet pushed her glasses up her nose again and frowned. "But where does the food in the Great Hall come from then?"

"It must be transposed from the kitchens."

"'Transposed'?"

"Swapped, basically. Transfered."

"Wicked," Harriet said with heart. She loved magic—though she questioned who _made_ the food if it wasn't magic. The professors? A sudden image of Professor Snape in Aunt Petunia's pink apron flashed into her mind and Harriet choked.

"Are you alright?"

"I-I'm fine."

Hermione sighed as she let her book close with a soft thump. "You could always tutor me in Defense if you don't want to do Transfiguration."

"I'm a wretched tutor, Hermione."

"You're the best in our class!"

"Yeah, but I don't know _how_ ," Harriet insisted as she returned to the shore. "It's not like I have some fancy technique or something. I just…do it, y'know?"

Hermione looked more dejected than ever. "It would figure you're a Defense prodigy."

Harriet started to laugh.

"You are!"

She laughed harder.

After Harriet's giggles subsided, she tugged on her socks and shoes again and they started along the path back toward the school, skirting the edge of the Forbidden Forest's shadow. They strolled on—until Harriet paused, watching a pair of horses graze near the grassy boundary. She had seen them before, from a distance, pulling the carriages that the older students had taken from Hogsmeade's station.

"What are you looking at?" Hermione asked.

"Those horses," Harriet said. "They're awful spooky, aren't they?" With great black wings and skeletal bodies, Harriet couldn't imagine an eerier creature—especially when she realized they weren't grazing, but instead picking over a dead rabbit.

Hermione wore an odd expression as she studied Harriet. "What horses?"

"Those, right there." she pointed.

"I…I don't see any horses, Harriet."

Was Hermione having a laugh? Harriet didn't think so, not because Hermione had no sense of humor, but because Hermione was more inclined to laugh than to make _others_ laugh. Why lie about this? Harriet rubbed at her eyes and hoped, not for the first time, that she wasn't going barmy.

"Alright, you two?"

The girls turned, then lifted their eyes to the familiar face of the giant who had helped them on their boat ride to Hogwarts with Professor Selwyn. _The groundskeeper_ , Harriet had heard one of the older Slytherin's call him. He wore a friendly smile beneath the tangle of his black beard, a drooling boarhound standing by his knee. Harriet barely rose to his thigh in height—which was understandable, considering she was only a half a foot taller than Professor Flitwick, who was part-goblin, for goodness' sake. Harriet hated being short.

The man peered down at her—then blinked. "Say, you wouldn't be James and Lily's girl, would ya?"

"Yes—?"

Harriet squeaked at his sudden movement, and then she was being smothered in a tight embrace, getting a face full of bristly beard and furry overcoat. Then she was on her feet again, staggering and more than a bit embarrassed. Had she ever been hugged before? Harriet couldn't remember.

"Shoulda known! Of course, I took you off Professor Snape myself, right after he got you from the ruins. Didn't mean him no harm, read the situation wrong, my mistake—."

"P-Professor Snape?" Harriet stuttered, befuddled by this latest turn of events. What was all this about ruins and the Potions Master?

The giant stopped rambling and his cheeks reddened. "Shouldn'ta mentioned that. Sorry—but you're Harriet! Got Lily's eyes exactly, and James' hair! Haven't introduced myself though, have I? Name's Rubeus Hagrid, and I'm the Keeper of Keys here at Hogwarts. Just callin' me Hagrid's fine, though, none of that 'sir' business."

"It's nice to meet you," Harriet responded in earnest. "You knew my parents?"

"'Course I did! Great people, Lily and James. Such a terrible thing to happen to them." Hagrid turned his glittering eyes toward Hermione and Harriet jumped to introduce her.

"This is my friend Hermione Granger." _Friend._ How odd it felt to say that.

"Pleasure to meet you, Mr Hagrid."

"Just Hagrid, that's fine. Great to meet you." Hagrid and Hermione shook hands, though the giant was very careful in doing so. "Would you two care for a spot a' tea? My hut's just there…."

He pointed out the cottage near the forest's edge with a patch of immature pumpkin vines by the door and a smudge of smoke trickling from the crooked chimney. Harriet and Hermione agreed, if only because Harriet really wanted to hear more about her parents and Hagrid seemed a decent sort. They sat at his homemade, over-sized table, and Hagrid served them great mugs of a tasty tea and rock cakes—which, they discovered, we far more like rocks and much less like cakes.

Hermione asked what duties as a groundskeeper entailed and Hagrid chattered on about the interesting creatures he tended to in the forest and his efforts to grow giant pumpkins for the feast in October. At one point he mentioned, "Quite a shock it was, you being Sorted into Slytherin, Harriet. Probably woulda upset James, but Lily woulda been fine with it."

"My parents wouldn't have liked me being in Slytherin?" Harriet asked, heart sinking.

"Both of them were Gryffindors, weren't they?" It wasn't a question. "And James was a Chaser for the Quidditch team on top of that. Terrific flyer, your dad. Had a lot of rivals in Slytherin—jealous, the lot of them. But Lily was different, didn't mind Slytherins after all, being friend with—." Hagrid cleared his throat. "They'd be awful proud of you. Houses don't matter, after all. Not really."

"That's right," Hermione said, sensing Harriet's distress. "All that matters is learning magic and doing your best, Harriet."

"Yeah," Harriet responded, though she wasn't so sure. Would her mum and dad be disappointed in her? She couldn't live by the expectations of dead people, of course, but she _wanted_ to be the kind of witch they could've taken pride in, had they been there with her. _Hermione's right_ , she decided. _Houses are just Houses. I'll just do my best for them—and for me_.

Conversation continued and Harriet wanted to ask more about James and Lily, but she was nervous the conversation would turn to _why_ she didn't know more about them and _who_ she was living with—or, _supposed_ to be living with. Harriet had learned a bit more about the MPA and Ministry laws from Hermione and knew she'd most likely be removed from the Dursleys because they were Muggles and she was a witch—but the possibility of being sent back remained, or relocated to a family like the Malfoys. Draco was a prat and Harriet didn't want to think what his parents were like. Hermione never talked about them.

What if she got sent to a family even worse than the Dursleys?

Lost in thought, Harriet scratched the boarhound's—introduced as Fang—head, and he drooled on her lap. There was a copy of the Prophet laid on the table, and she glanced it over. An article near the back caught her attention.

"Someone broke into Gringotts," she mentioned. Hagrid dropped a rock cake.

"Really?" Hermione asked. "The Malfoys told me the bank was impregnable, and I couldn't imagine them putting their gold anywhere unsafe."

"The person didn't steal anything, apparently," Harriet continued, reading more of the article. "Err—the goblins said the vault was emptied earlier that day. Hey, it happened on my birthday! That's seren—seren—?"

"Serendipitous," Hermione supplied as she sipped her tea.

Harriet returned the paper to its proper place on the table and changed the topic—much to Hagrid's apparent relief. Certainly Harriet wondered what was so precious someone would risk breaking into Gringotts and aggravating the goblins for it, but a bank break-in was hardly the strangest thing she'd seen in the Wizarding world. She mostly thought about her parents, and about Hagrid telling her she had Lily's eyes and James' hair. What else did she have?

Harriet and Hermione drank their tea, hid rock cakes in their pockets, and headed back to school after a very pleasant afternoon.


	18. gryffindor

_**xviii. gryffindor**_

"Who, on earth, thought _flying broomsticks_ were a good idea?"

Harriet asked herself the same thing when she saw the notice of their upcoming lessons posted on the common room board, though not with the same ire Elara injected into the words. The sentiment wasn't one reflected in the other Slytherins; the older students regaled the first years with tales of Quidditch and their own adventures while the first years themselves boasted about their brooms left at family estates or sneaking off to fly in the summertime when their parents weren't paying attention. Malfoy swore he almost collided with a helicopter.

"Like he even knows what a helicopter is," Harriet muttered under breath. Hermione coughed.

Harriet, Elara, and Hermione seemed to be the only ones who had never been flying, and the others made sure they felt every bit as inferior as the pure-blood Slytherins from proper pure-blood homes deigned them to be. Pansy had taken to stating "She can't _really_ be a Black," while in Elara's hearing and Hermione snuck a copy of _Quidditch Through the Age_ from the library when she thought Harriet wasn't looking. Draco liked to lean over his desk in class and tell Harriet she was evidence of how far "blood-traitor" families fall.

All in all, Harriet's second week at Hogwarts was not nearly as great as the first.

The Slytherins departed History of Magic on Thursday and, instead of enjoying a free period as they had the week prior, made their way to the main courtyard and the grassy quad beyond. Harriet, Elara, and Hermione hung behind the rest of their classmates—who all but raced forward in anticipation, the boys leading the way with the girls feigning indifference as they followed.

"I wandered through Quality Quidditch Supplies in Diagon Alley," Harriet commented, uneasy. "And saw some pictures of people flying at Quidditch games and stuff. It _looks_ like it could be fun."

Hermione sniffed. Elara had been looking a bit green since lunch and only paled further once they saw the line of brooms waiting for them. "It seems an utterly illogical mode of transportation," Hermione said. "When they have the Floo Network, and Apparition, the Knight Bus, and Portkeys available—."

"I don't have any idea what those are," Harriet interrupted, bemused.

"Honestly, Harriet, how did you even _get_ to Diagon Alley?"

"Walked." She quickly backtracked when Hermione gave her a startled look. "Muggle bus. Took the Muggle bus."

Elara said nothing, even when Hermione's gaze rose to hers with an expectant brow quirked. Harriet didn't like that her two friends—or her one friend and almost-friend—didn't seem to like one another very much. They never argued or fought; in fact, Hermione and Elara barely ever exchanged a word. Elara was difficult to talk to, Harriet knew, and she thought this might be why Hermione—who appreciated forthrightness in all its forms—often got frustrated with her. Indeed, even now, Hermione huffed a breath and turned away when Elara didn't answer her.

"Find yourself a broom. Stand next to it—no touching yet!" called Madam Hooch, their flying instructor. Harriet and the two with her meandered over to pick their own spots, and a minute later the Gryffindors ambled up, their approach heard long before they appeared by the raucous echo emanating from the courtyard.

"Great," Malfoy sneered. "Longbottom and his leeches have arrived."

Harriet and the rest of the class soon learned Madam Hooch had attended Hogwarts with Neville's grandmother, and the other woman apparently enjoyed writing to all her old schoolmates to boast about her "talented grandson," about how he excelled, how he'd had the very best tutors in everything—even flying. Neville chatted loudly with the instructor about being taught to fly by _the_ Arnold Vogler of the Heidelberg Harriers and the Gryffindors were suitably impressed while the boys of Slytherin rolled their eyes. Harriet, not knowing what a Heidelberg Harrier or an Arnold Vogler was, just toyed the grass and waited for instructions.

"To your place now, Mr Longbottom, thank you. Hold your dominant arm out over your broom, and in a firm voice say, 'up!' Are we clear? Go ahead!"

Feeling silly, Harriet did as Madam Hooch instructed—and her rather raggedy broom leapt right off the ground and into her hand. She gave it a surprised glance, then looked about at the others, who had mixed levels of success. Malfoy and Longbottom, of course, had their brooms in hands and smug grins on their faces. Ron managed it after repeating himself. Some brooms rose about halfway off the grass before faltering, falling with dull thumps. Elara's almost made it, and she swooped forward to snatch it before Madam Hooch could see. Hermione's rolled on the ground as her face became increasingly red and Daphne Greengrass snickered.

Harriet scrutinized her broom. With twigs sticking out every which way, it didn't look anything like those sleek products she'd seen in Diagon.

"Now," Madam Hooch called once everyone had their brooms. Hermione, like several others, had finally given up and grabbed it off the ground. "Straddle your broom and take the handle in a firm grip—like so." She displayed the proper technique for them on a broom of her own and Harriet mimicked her. It felt ridiculous to hold that position for so long while Hooch walked along the line, correcting as she went, but Harriet's patience was rewarded when the instructor paused by Malfoy to fix his hands.

"I've been flying for years!" he argued.

"Well, you've been flying _wrong_ for years," she rebuffed. If the Gryffindors hadn't laughed, Harriet was sure she would have.

At last, Madam Hooch reached the end of the arrangement and told them they could kick off. "No more than ten feet!" she ordered above the excited whispers. "Anyone who goes higher without my say so will be grounded! On my mark. One, two, three…."

She blew her whistle. Harriet pushed herself upward—and her apprehension faded to white noise in the back of her mind as the weightless sensation of flight seeped into her very bones. Her hands stopped strangling the broom's handle and her posture loosened, relaxed, and though the urge to keep rising up and up an up roared in her ears, Harriet stopped just shy of ten feet, kicking her legs.

Elara, who had become greener and greener as the lesson progressed, only made it two feet before she pitched herself off her broom and vomited on the lawn.

"Ew!" Pansy shrieked, chorused by several of the girls in Gryffindor.

"Elara!" Harriet pointed her broom toward the ground and landed as swiftly as she could, going to the other girl's side. Hermione and Tracey Davis did the same, along with Theodore Nott, though the others looked a bit more unsure about what they were doing. Elara retched again.

"Oh dear," Madam Hooch said with a tired sigh, feet thumping on the dirt. "There's always one." She shooed Harriet back as she approached, took a firm grip on Elara's elbow, and hefted the ill girl to her feet. "Motion sickness among the old families always seems more common than not. You there—Granger was it?"

"Yes, ma'am?" Hermione responded.

"Take Miss Black on to see Madam Pomfrey."

Harriet wanted to protest, wanted to take her herself, but there was no reason to be fussy so long as Elara was all right in the end. She watched Hermione lead an unsteady Elara away and Harriet didn't think she imagined the grateful look on Hermione's face as they hurried from the quad and the collection of waiting brooms. Madam Hooch ushered Harriet farther down the line, away from the sick splattered in the grass, and she somehow managed to be slotted between Ronald Weasley and Draco Malfoy.

 _Great_.

Malfoy didn't hesitate to lampoon Elara. He was in rare form today, his jaw locked in that practiced grin just shy of a sneer, pale hair windblown like the fluff off a dandelion. "What kind of witch can't fly?" he asked aloud, earning a snort from Goyle. One didn't have to be clever to earn a laugh from Goyle or Crabbe; one simply had to look in their direction after speaking and wait. "It all comes down to blood, my father says, and _her_ branch of the Black family has gone rotten. Did you know that, Potter? Whole lot of them went spare. Black's father is a madman, after all."

"Stop being a _tit_ , Malfoy," Harriet hissed through her teeth as she kept her eyes on Madam Hooch.

"He was a blood-traitor, too. But you would know all about that, wouldn't you?"

No, Harriet wouldn't. She couldn't fathom _why_ everything always came down to blood with Malfoy and people like him. To use Hermione's word, it seemed quite _inane_. Magic was magic to Harriet. She'd rather be a Muggle-born than a plain Muggle—and if being a pure-blood meant having a bunch of blokes in her family like Draco, then maybe she was better off being just a half-blood. She'd put enough pieces together between her Aunt Petunia and Hagrid to realize her mum must have been a Muggle-born just like Hermione, and that was just fine with her.

"Weasley would know all about blood-traitors, too," Malfoy said, speaking to the quiet red-head on Harriet's other side. "He comes from a whole wretched _brood_ of them."

Ron's ears almost disappeared against his hair as blood rushed into them.

"How do your parents manage to feed you lot, Weasel? Does your mum just sell your filthy blood in vials as fertilizer?"

"You shut up about my mum, Malfoy," Ron spat as he trembled with rage.

"Does your family just share the one bed in that shack you call a house?"

"Stop it," Harriet said to Draco—and suddenly Ron rounded on her.

"I don't need your help, stupid _Slytherin_ ," he snarled, eyes glassy, blotchy patches of purple color blooming in his scrunched face. "I know all about your family, Potter. All the Potters have been Gryffindors since anyone can remember, and your mum and dad were both Gryffindors—so what's wrong with you? Why are you a slimy Slytherin? Bet your folks would be ashamed."

All week Harriet had been annoyed by the Slytherins' jeering her about flying; she was worried about Elara and mad Malfoy kept belittling Hermione, who was bloody brilliant and didn't deserve the rubbish that came spilling out of him like his head was a bin with a crack in the bottom. Defense Against the Dark Arts made her terribly nervous, and somewhere very distant from herself she kept remembering she lacked a home, and terror seized her when Harriet imagined what would happen when Christmas came rolling in, or the summer hols. Ron's words hit her anxieties like a stick whacking a beehive. Suddenly her arm jerked itself up, and her hand collided with Ron's mouth.

Honestly, the punch surprised the boy more than anything, and it hurt Harriet's hand rather than his face. Stunned, Ron took a step back, the class gasped, and Harriet had her fist still raised when Professor McGonagall shouted, "Harriet _Potter_!"

Harriet blinked, then stared at her own hand in baffled horror as the Transfiguration professor swept across the quad from her position near the courtyard's entrance and towered over the scattered students. "Twenty points from Slytherin, Miss Potter! We do not strike others here at Hogwarts! You'll have a detention—and your Head of House will be hearing about this!"

The horror thickened in her middle, folding tighter and tighter until it sat like one of those bezoars in a goat's stomach. _Detention_. Barely two weeks had passed, and Harriet already had a detention! What if she got _suspended_? Where would she go? What would she do? Could Hogwarts write to the Dursleys? What would the Dursleys say?

Class commenced, but Harriet wasn't allowed to fly again. Professor McGonagall dragged her to the shadow thrown by one of the school's spires and, in a quieter tone, demanded to know what had gotten into her, why she felt the need to hit somebody else.

"It was an accident, Professor," she said, and Harriet didn't think that a lie. She hadn't _meant_ to punch Weasley, and certainly if a modicum of thought had passed through her brain, she would have restrained herself. Professor McGonagall didn't believe her and spent the remainder of the class scolding Harriet. She felt small, wilted like one of Aunt Petunia's violets on an extraordinarily hot summer day, and though she considered telling McGonagall one of her Gryffindors had been running his mouth—she refrained.

Harriet didn't know why. Tattling didn't seem like the right thing to do at the time.

High above their heads, Neville Longbottom took a spherical glass ball from his robe pocket—a Remembrall, she would later learn—and passed it back and forth between himself and his friends. They laughed and McGonagall watched, lips pursed and her eyes bright with a curious, expectant glint.

Harriet followed the flying students with her eyes as they swooped through the air, and just for a moment, she really did hate the Gryffindors.

 **A/N: No 1st year Quidditch for Harriet. I don't find her quite as daring as her male counterpart, and she's not the "Girl Who Lived." No special privileges :P. Ron seems a bit rude here, but his pride probably couldn't stand a Slytherin girl sticking up for him.**


	19. snake tongue

**_xix. snake tongue_**

Harriet stabbed one of her eggs and yellow goo spread across her otherwise empty plate.

"You should really eat more," Hermione chided as her friend spread the yolk about with the tines of her fork. Harriet scrunched her face and didn't reply, intent on being glum. Every so often she would glance toward the High Table, where the professors sat enjoying their breakfasts and each other's company. Professor Slytherin chattered quietly with Professor Selwyn, Professor Snape scowled at his porridge, and Professor McGonagall leaned closer to the Headmaster so she could mutter near his ear. Professor Dumbledore glanced toward the Slytherin table, and Harriet looked down so fast she almost planted her face in her eggs.

It was a miserable way to start a Friday.

Professor McGonagall hadn't mentioned anything about her detention yet, but Harriet wasn't optimistic. If she got sent to Professor Slytherin, what would he do? Was caning still a thing at Hogwarts? State Muggle schools in the UK didn't allow that kind of treatment, but Hogwarts was an old-fashioned kind of place and Harriet plainly remembered that Smeltings had handed out those bloody sticks to their own students. She hadn't hurt Weasley. Her punishment shouldn't be so severe…right?

Livi moved his head where it lay upon her chest and Harriet hunched her shoulders so the shift wouldn't be noticed by others. " _There are many riversss,_ " he hissed. " _And many bridgesss to crosss them._ "

Horned Serpents could occasionally say rather insightful things—though Harriet had discovered Livi was young enough yet to be confused by his own insights, and sometimes he said things that made no sense at all.

This was one of those times.

Harriet sighed and discreetly rubbed at his snout. The post arrived with its usual dusting of feathers and shrill hoots, and one owl swung away from the main group to hover before Harriet. It extended his leg for her to take the missive attached there, and she did so with trepidation.

 _Miss Potter—_

 _I have decided to forego notifying your Head of House about your behavior during Thursday's flying lesson. Instead, Professor Snape has volunteered to oversee your detention himself. Please report to his classroom this evening after dinner._

 _I do hope you will reflect upon your actions and make better choices in the future._

 _Prof. M. McGonagall._

"Oh, this is _worse_!" Harriet said aloud, garnering several curious glances.

"Who's it from?" Hermione asked as she smeared marmalade on a piece of toast and laid it on Harriet's plate.

"Professor McGonagall," Harriet replied, hoping her voice held steady despite her misery. "She's set my detention for tonight with Professor _Snape_."

"So?" Malfoy snorted. Harriet hadn't realized he'd been listening in. "What's wrong with Professor Snape?"

"…nothing, I guess." Harriet glanced at the wizard in question. He'd finished glaring at his porridge and now glared at Slytherin, then at Dumbledore. "He's just…." _Terrifying_. _Just looks like he might stuff me into a cauldron and boil me alive._

"Snape's great. He looks out for Slytherins," Malfoy said as he stuck his nose in the air. "Mind, _I_ think it's ridiculous you got detention in the first place. The Weasel deserved a good punch in the mouth for talking back to his betters."

Harriet snorted. "I'm a 'better' now? Weren't you banging on about me being a blood-traitor just like Ron?"

"It doesn't matter; you're still in Slytherin, and that makes you better than any of the Weasleys."

Pansy sniffed and flipped a coiffed ringlet of hair out of her face. "A real witch would have used magic and cursed him."

"A _real witch_ would have been expelled," Hermione sniped. She shoved her plate away and stood. "I'm going to the library before class."

"Nobody cares, Granger."

 _Harriet_ cared, so she stuffed the toast into her mouth—getting marmalade on her face—and departed from the Great Hall with her friend.

xXxXx

With every step that drew her nearer the Potions Master's lair, Harriet wished she had taken the detention with Professor Slytherin instead.

 _He's wicked scary, too_ , Harriet thought as she stopped before the door to the Potions classroom and took a breath. _But at least his class isn't literally in the dungeons. I wonder if they actually held people here in the old days…._

Harriet knocked and a cool voice responded. "Enter."

She did so, pushing on the door so it inched inward on thick iron hinges. The boards of the door were battered, dented and scratched and a bit twisted from Professor Snape entering his classroom in a snit, kicking it open and letting it slam against the inner wall with its rusted rivets bolted to the stones. Pickled things floated in the jars on the walls and Harriet always stared at them whenever she had Potions, both fascinated and repulsed by the strange things the wizard had preserved in innocuous glass containers.

The professor himself sat at his desk in the permanent semi-darkness of the castle's sub-levels with a quill in hand and a scowl on his face. His black eyes rose from the parchment before him when Harriet slipped inside. The scowl deepened. "Miss Potter."

"H-hello, Professor Snape. I'm here for my detention."

His eyes dropped to the parchment again in dismissal. "So you are." His arm lifted and he pointed one pale hand toward the far wall, where a line of cauldrons waited on the counter near the stone sink and the faucet shaped like a gargoyle's mouth. "Clean the cauldrons, Miss Potter. No magic."

 _That's it?_ Harriet thought as she scuttled across the room to the waiting mess. Harriet had plenty of practice in non-magical scrubbing, so this task hardly seemed a punishment at all. _Well, what did you expect_? she asked herself, peeved. _You're such an idiot. You didn't actually think he was going to poison you or beat you or something, right?_

Harriet didn't answer that, not even in the privacy of her own brain. Instead, she fished out the soap and cleaning implements from the proper cabinet and turned the water on. Professor Snape gave no further instructions. He went back to work, quill scratching away at the parchments Harriet suspected were student essays, and the water gushed from the gargoyle in a frigid, gurgling stream.

She removed her hampering outer robes, folding them carefully before setting them on the nearest dry table. Livi stirred beneath her uniform and Harriet paused to make certain his outline wasn't visible through her clothes. " _Sss…cold_ ," the serpent complained as he placed his head in the crook of her shoulder and left it there. One of his nubby horns jabbed Harriet in the neck and she poked him over, wincing.

" _It'll only get colder_ ," Harriet responded, her voice covered by the sound of the water. The dungeons would be frozen in the harshness of the highland winters and she didn't look forward to that. How did the older Slytherins manage? " _Will you be okay? You don't—you don't hibernate or something, do you?_ "

" _No_ ," Livi said. " _I am not like thossse othersss._ " He referred to snakes who weren't himself as "other," as if they didn't deserve to be in the same species as him. " _I do not endure the ssslow ssseasson._ "

" _The slow season?_ "

" _Misstresss keepsss me warm. My blood doesss not cool_."

Harriet snorted. _Harriet Potter qualities: nice place for snakes to cuddle. Wonderful_.

"Something amusing, Miss Potter?"

"No, Professor Snape."

He went back to writing again and Harriet concentrated on her task, ignoring her professor and Livi's complaining. The cauldrons proved harder to clean than expected, difficult to maneuver and coarse in texture, so the gunk and stains settled deep in the pitted metal and Harriet had to exert considerable effort to scrub the rubbish away. She didn't like to think about what she was getting stuck under the nails of her frozen fingers. Brains? Eyes? Dung? A mix of all three?

An hour passed before Professor Snape set aside his markings and came to loom behind Harriet, inspecting the cauldrons she had already finished. "Professor McGonagall tells me you struck Weasley. Why?"

Unlike the Transfiguration professor, Snape didn't sound accusatory; rather, he had a sharp, inquisitive air about him, reserving judgment until he better understood the situation. Harriet hesitated—but then decided Professor Snape probably didn't care enough about stupid childish spats to get Ron in trouble. "I didn't mean to," she grumbled. "He said some…some stuff and—I don't know. I got upset. I didn't know I'd hit him until it had already happened."

"What _stuff_ did Weasley say, Potter?"

Harriet frowned at the brush in her hand, at the grimy bristles and raw spots on her knuckles. "He said my mum and dad would have been ashamed of me being in Slytherin because they were Gryffindors, but I don't think that's true." _At least I hope not_.

She didn't notice Snape stiffen. She didn't notice the way his hand curled into a fist behind his back, or the dangerous flick of light touch his eyes, because in an instant the emotion was gone.

"You shouldn't pay attention to the foolish prattling of Gryffindors," he sneered. "They are arrogant and foolhardy to the last. Your year will be especially insufferable because of _Longbottom;_ the boy king of ignorance and unquestioning _virtue_."

Harriet didn't agree with that—or, well, she didn't _think_ she did. A few Gryffindors were friendly enough, in that they didn't scowl or mutter or walk away when a Slytherin passed them by, though she rarely witnessed Slytherins themselves behaving friendly in turn. Malfoy excelled at antagonizing the House of Lions, berating Neville because he was famous or Ron because he was poor or Dean because he was a Muggle-born. Pansy made fun of Lavender's hair or Fay Dunbar's freckled complexion.

She paused in her work to rub at her sore skin. The dynamic in Slytherin baffled Harriet; on one hand, the House was filled with people like Draco: sharp-tongued, affluent, hateful. On the other, students like herself dotted the population: indifferent, patient, empathetic. Harriet wouldn't say she was kind, not when life with the Dursleys had honed her too much, like a knife sharpened until the metal became brittle, and her suspicions ran deep. She still didn't feel the need to be cruel like Malfoy, though.

 _Then again_ , Harriet reminded herself. _I did punch Ron in the mouth_.

Snape criticized one of the cauldrons she'd already cleaned and Harriet hurried it back into the water. He retrieved his wand—black like Elara's, the design simple, obscured by his hand—and muttered a spell that lifted the finished cauldrons from their places on the wet counter so he could march them into the storage cupboard. His voice rose from inside when he spoke again.

"That being said, you cannot go about striking cretins, no matter what nonsense comes dribbling out of their mouths. It is unbecoming, especially from a Slytherin. Our House is held to a higher standard, Miss Potter, and your behavior must conform to that standard or you will be having more detentions. Let me assure you, I have _far_ less pleasant tasks I could assign."

Shivering at the thought, Harriet raised her voice when she answered. "Yes, sir." Livi poked his invisible head out of her collar and flicked a curious tongue against her earlobe. "Ew, gross."

"What was that?" Snape returned to the doorway.

"Nothing, Professor."

Pausing, he folded his arms against his chest, looking more sinister than ever with only his pale face visible in the gloom, his eyes narrowed. "I don't appreciate backchat, Pot—." Snape's voice ended with a sudden breath when Harriet turned her head, reaching for a dirty ladle. "Miss Potter!"

Harriet jumped as he shouted and the ladle slipped through her fingers to clatter upon the stone floor. "P-Professor Snape?"

He had his wand out, pointed at her, and Harriet's heart raced. "Miss Potter, are you aware there is a _highly_ venomous snake _tucked into your bloody shirt_?!"

"Sn—?" Harriet froze, because while she of course _knew_ Livi was there, she couldn't fathom how _Snape_ knew when the serpent in question was mostly out of sight and invisible to boot.

Professor Snape took a step forward, wand raised, and Harriet's hand flew to Livi's head. "Don't!" she cried, unsure what the wizard's intentions were. "H-he's my familiar, Professor."

His advanced stopped, as did the sharp movement of his black wand. " _Familiar_?"

"Yes. I know snakes weren't on the letter about pets, but he wouldn't hurt anyone, I swear! And I keep him out of sight—."

"You cannot keep a large, _deadly_ snake, Miss Potter! Remove it!"

"Well, I tried to tell him that before and he said—."

If Harriet thought Professor Snape was pale before, she was abruptly treated to another level of sallowness when the professor sat down—hard—on the edge of the nearest table, as if his knees had given out on him. "He _said_?"

"Yeah," Harriet replied as she maneuvered Livi's head back under her collar and into perceived safety. "I mean—yes, sir."

Snape seemed to struggle with words for a minute, mouth opening twice without sound coming out before he ground his teeth. "You can…speak with snakes, Miss Potter?"

"Yes, sir. Most of them are real nutters. Mad about bugs." Harriet shifted under the uncomfortable scrutiny of Professor Snape's expressionless stare. "That's not…not normal, is it? Not even for witches?"

"No," he responded slowly. "It is not a common trait."

Aunt Petunia's voice rattled in Harriet's head like the last mint in a tin. _Freak. Freak. Freak_.

"Your ability is called _Parseltongue_ , and you would be referred to as a _Parselmouth_ , Miss Potter. Salazar Slytherin, our House Founder, was famous for having the same skill." He heaved a weary sigh. "Who else knows?"

"No one," Harriet said, then reconsidered. "Well, Elara I think. She saw me chatting with him at the store, but I don't think she knows I have him here."

Snape squeezed his eyes shut, muttered something under his breath, then snapped, "You will _not_ tell anyone else—especially your Head of House. Do you understand?"

"Yes, sir." Harriet didn't really understand. She hadn't disclosed her ability to anyone because it would mean exposing Livi and she had become rather attached to the snooty snake. She didn't want him to be sent away. The Potions Master was quite earnest, however. "Professor Snape? Is it—is being a Par—Parselmouth? Is it bad or something?"

He didn't answer at first. Rather, Professor Snape rose to his full height and tucked his wand back into his sleeve. "It is not _bad_ or _good_ , Miss Potter, it is simply a skill almost wholly unique to yourself, and one often misunderstood. Should you have brains in your head, you will realize the advantage in keeping knowledge of your true abilities close so they cannot be used against you—and yes, _they_ would use this against you in a heartbeat."

Harriet didn't ask him to explain his vague usage of _they_. "That's very…Slytherin, Professor."

Snape smirked—or at least Harriet thought he did. The expression dissolved into disdain quicker than milk dispersing into tea. His eyes glinted and Harriet gulped. "Leave the rest of this and return directly to the dormitories. I had best not see you in detention again, Potter, or there will be consequences."

"Yes, sir."

"Go."

She snatched up her robes and pulled her arms through the sleeves as she rushed from the dungeon. Harriet was almost back to the common room when she realized she never did find out how Snape had seen Livi in the first place.


	20. samhain

**_xx. samhain_**

Life at Hogwarts continued on.

On the Tuesday that followed Harriet's strange detention, she finally plucked up the courage to approach Weasley after they'd been dismissed from Defense Against the Dark Arts. He scowled when she asked him to hang back a moment and so did the other Gryffindors, but they moved along and Ron remained, knuckles white from his tight grip on his bag's strap.

"What do you want, Potter?"

"I, err, just wanted to apologize. About Thursday. About, you know…." Harriet scratched at the back of her neck. She'd given her actions considerable thought over the weekend and didn't like that violent impulse hidden in her heart. It reminded her too much of Uncle Vernon's bellowing and Aunt Petunia's quick, sharp slaps. Elara had pointed out how a childish disagreement could—as Hermione said— _fulminate_ into a full-blown rivalry, and Harriet didn't want _enemies_ at school. She could swallow her pride, especially when she was in the wrong. "It wasn't right of me. I still think what you said was foul, but that's not an excuse for me to go hitting you. If I hit Malfoy every time he said something nasty about me or my family, I'd be in detention until seventh year. So, I'm sorry."

Ron was stunned. He gaped, wide-eyed, until he snapped his mouth shut and flushed. "That's fine," he muttered. "I was…the stuff I said about your parents wasn't on. Malfoy just…."

"Got under your skin?" Harriet supplied, and Ron nodded. "Yeah, I think he does that to everyone, even in his own House."

"He's a prat." Weasley snorted as the tension in his lanky body lessened, shoulders slouching and his face returning to its normal color. "You're alright, Potter—for a sneaky Slytherin."

Harriet grinned.

"Oi, Ron!" came a voice from the corridor's head. Neville Longbottom stood there with Dean Thomas and Seamus Finnigan. "Stop playing with the snakes and come on, mate!"

"I'm coming!" Ron called back. To Harriet, he added, "See you around, Potter."

"Bye, Ron."

Ron and Harriet didn't become friends, but sometimes they struck up amicable conversations and he didn't pitch a fit if they somehow wound up as partners in one of their shared classes. Harriet thought him far more pleasant than Malfoy or Crabbe or Goyle—and Neville Longbottom, who had it out for her even after Ron told him he'd forgiven her for their stupid scuffle. Resentment still curled in her chest whenever she looked at Neville, so being churlish and short with the Boy Who Lived was far too easy for Harriet.

September dribbled into October and the fantastic wilds of the rural highlands began to chill in earnest around the castle. Hermione and Elara still didn't speak much and didn't seem to have any friends at all aside from Harriet—not that Harriet was any better. She bickered with her dorm mates, arguing with Pansy about her hogging the counters in the washroom with her stupid make-up, or with Millicent about her cat purposefully clawing up Harriet's bedding. Their disagreement peaked when Set threw one of Pansy's powder poof things at Millicent's head when the burly girl wasn't looking, covering the dorm in white powder while Pansy shrieked and Millicent fumed.

Both girls ended up in the infirmary, Harriet with a black eye and Millicent with a split lip and neither inclined to tell displeased Madam Pomfrey what happened.

Hallowe'en, or _Samhain_ as the pure-bloods in Slytherin called it, fell on a Thursday and their final classes for the day were canceled in favor of a holiday feast awaiting them instead of dinner. The older students waxed poetic about the marvelous treats served at past feasts and the first years were so excited to attend teaching became difficult. Luckily, Slytherin didn't have Potions that day, but Defense Against the Dark Arts proved a trial with a prickly Professor Slytherin supervising.

Harriet was uncommonly quiet for much of the day. Around her students laughed and whispered and kicked their feet in eager anticipation, and she couldn't help but remember that, exactly one decade ago, a madman no one would say the name of broke into her home, murdered her parents, and left Harriet for dead. Not at all a cheery thought to have, but it remained with Harriet, dampening her mood and the buzzing thrill enticing the others.

Sitting next to Harriet in History of Magic, Elara nudged her elbow and lifted a brow in silent question. Harriet just shrugged and went back to her notes, trying to concentrate on what Professor Selwyn was saying.

"—and 1689 saw the first proposal for the original International Statue for Wizarding Secrecy being signed into law by an early iteration of the I.C.W. The law would not be enforced until 1692—and would, subsequently, lead to the creation of the Ministry of Magic around the Wizengamot in 1707. As the Wizarding world shut itself off from the Muggle populace, we found it necessary to create more complicated councils and bureaus responsible for regulating magic and hiding its traces from the ignorant masses. Which of you can tell me a reason for the introduction of the ISWS?"

As usual, Hermione's hand rose and, as usual, Professor Selwyn looked past her to the other Slytherins. Malfoy lifted his own hand and Selwyn called on him.

"Yes, Mr Malfoy?"

Malfoy thrust out his chin as he said, "Well, Professor Selwyn, Muggles started killing witches and wizards, didn't they? Because they were jealous of our magic." He spoke in the affirmative and slanted a scathing look in Hermione's direction. "My father says the _Muggles_ started burning themselves and magical kind alike, unable to tell the difference."

"Correct," Selwyn said, simpering. He came to stand before Hermione's desk. "Yet another example of Muggle stupidity. The ISWS would, actually, be the basis upon which our current Minister built his campaign for the MPA. He sited the irrational behavior of Muggles and the pathetic emotional pathos of Muggle-borns as reasons they had to be protected from _themselves_." The set of his face was unmistakably mocking as he watched Hermione, who had hunched down in her chair, embarrassed and trembling. A few Hufflepuffs had the same look about them.

Harriet drew air to speak and Elara nudged her again, harder, her blank gaze still pointed straight ahead. _Right_ , Harriet told herself, slumping. _Right. I'll get detention if I backchat Professor Selwyn and Snape'll skin me alive, probably._ He was suspicious of her, especially after the "I-did-not-head-butt-Bulstrode-in-the-face" incident, which Harriet stood by, because she _didn't_ hit the other girl first. _Besides, I would just embarrass Hermione._

Throughout the rest of the lesson, Harriet kept glancing at the back of her friend's head, trying to think of what to say, and when the bell rang, she was no closer to knowing. She rushed out into the hall after Hermione, who dashed ahead of the others, and grabbed her arm. "Hermione—."

"Just—just—I want to be alone, Harriet," Hermione said in a high voice, refusing to lift her head as she kept her books close to her chest in a constricting hold. " _Please_."

She jerked herself free and left Harriet standing there, hand still raised, feeling unhappy and inept. Hermione raced from the corridor and out of sight. Elara eased to Harriet's side with silent grace and remained with her even as the others pushed around them, voices raised, excitement once again thrumming in the halls like lifeblood pumping through veins.

"The feast is soon," Elara commented.

"What about Hermione?" Harriet replied, glum. "She's going to miss it!"

"I'm sure she'll show up—and if not, that's her choice." Elara shrugged. "It's not as if she'll forget."

That didn't sit well with Harriet, yet she saw little other recourse. She nodded her head and shoved her glassed back up her nose. "I'm going to go check the dorms anyway, then meet you in the library before dinner?"

"Yes," Elara said. If she disagreed with Harriet's plan, she gave no indication, as carefully blank as ever. Harriet waved goodbye and set out. She didn't find Hermione in the empty common room or the first year dorms, much to Harriet's disappointment, so she settled for taking Livi from his hiding place beneath her bed so she could sneak him food at the feast later on. She worried about Hermione but wanted to give her friend the privacy she wanted. It was the only thing Harriet could do.

She hated how Muggle-borns were treated, how they were ridiculed and thought of as lesser. What did it matter? Harriet had grown up with Muggles too, just like Hermione, so what did it matter that she was a half-blood? What did it matter that her mum and dad were a witch and wizard and Hermione's folks weren't? Hermione was a witch just like Harriet, just like stupid Pansy and stupid Millicent, who punched even harder than stupid Dudley did.

Thinking about her parents only soured Harriet's mood further. With concerted effort, she forced a neutral expression onto her face and journeyed to the library, where she met Elara and buried her head in some half-hearted studying of seventeenth century Wizarding laws. They went to the feast an hour later.

Live bats swooped from the twilit ceiling of the Great Hall, swathes of glittering spiderwebs spun between the rafters, Hagrid's pumpkins carved in spooky grimaces and Charmed to cackle or spit little candle flames between jagged teeth. Sweets of every possible flavor or combination burdened the tables: pies bulging with candied fruits, tarts smeared in glaze, dripping confectionery goodness, clouds of spun sugar and chocolates stuffed with a dozen different kinds of cream. Small paper ghosts flapped and moaned as they drifted between the subdued candles as the real ghosts eyed them with derision.

As usual, the resident specters drifted away as soon as they spotted Harriet. The Bloody Baron stared at her the longest before he too lost his nerve and floated to a different table.

Harriet forgot her troubles for a time, sucked into the festive spirit with the rest of the first years. Distantly she remembered past Hallowe'ens, where Dudley would sit outside her cupboard with his back to the door and gorge on sweets until he made himself sick, and Harriet would be blamed for his lack of self-control. To think that she would be in a place like this, a place thrumming with magic, serving such food, while Dudley remained miles and miles away at Smeltings probably getting whacked by other students with their Smeltings sticks made Harriet's night.

Then the Muggle Studies professor slammed open the doors and came sprinting along the main aisle. "Troll!" he shrieked, face pale and gleaming with perspiration. "Troll! Troll in the dungeons!"

He fell in a dead faint, the sound of his body hitting the floor resounding in the silence that followed his proclamation. Then, the hall erupted.

Harriet slapped her hands over her ears in the resulting chaos, taken aback by the level noise. Students screamed, terrified, and Headmaster Dumbledore had to use his wand to bellow for silence before he could be heard. "Remain calm. Prefects, lead your Houses to your dormitories while the professors search the castle. Professor Slytherin, if you would see to your students—?"

Professor Slytherin didn't look all that pleased at being told to babysit, but he nodded in acquiescence. Harriet wondered why Dumbledore told him to stay behind— _he's the Defense teacher!_ —until she remembered the Slytherin dorms were _in_ the dungeons and quickly paled. Benches toppled when people stood in a surge of movement. Dumbledore banished the feast with a swish of his wand, and Professor Slytherin strode right down the middle of the table to reach the front of his House—not that anyone would have dared stand in the man's way.

Looking about, Harriet realized something she should have realized right away; Hermione was not there.


	21. the harder they fall

**_xxi. the harder they fall_**

"Hermione?" Harriet said aloud, voice going unheard in the general calamity. "Hermione! Has anyone seen Hermione?"

"Granger?" The girl next to her spoke, a third year she didn't know the name of. Harriet bobbed her head in affirmation. "I saw her in the first floor bathroom crying earlier."

Harriet's heart sunk. _Oh_ , she thought in despair. _I'm a shite friend. Perfectly worthless, but she doesn't know about the troll! What if she wanders into the dungeons before it's caught?! I have to tell someone_ —.

She tried. Kicking and swearing, Harriet elbowed her way to the front of the mass and attempted to get Professor Slytherin's attention, but his focus was on leading the Slytherins as a whole out of the Great Hall, shunting aside a line of terrified Hufflepuffs so the House of Serpents could go ahead of them. Harriet doubled-back toward the High Table and struggled through until she caught a flash of billowing black robes.

"Professor Snape—!"

It was no use. He darted out the side passage the staff used to enter the hall and the other professors were quick to follow, Dumbledore looking particularly menacing before them despite his resplendent purple robes. Harriet spotted Draco between Crabbe and Goyle and grabbed his wrist. His shriek went unremarked.

"Unhand me, Potter! How dare—?!"

"Draco! Draco, Hermione's not here—!"

He slapped her hand and Harriet let go. "I don't care where the Mudblood is," he spat. "I hope she gets flattened by the troll, wretched know-it-all that she is!"

Fury exploded in Harriet's heart like a living thing, surreal in its intensity, and she wanted nothing more than to strike Malfoy—detentions be damned. He must have seen it in her face because he backed away. "What's _wrong_ with you?" she snarled. "Isn't Hermione like your foster sister? How can you be so bloody terrible?!"

Draco said nothing and swiftly disappeared into the crowd.

"Harriet—."

Harriet whipped around to find Elara standing next to her. The taller girl proved a sturdier barrier against the shoving students at their backs, more grounded than Harriet who kept getting shoved about like a trout in a whirlpool. Elara extended her hand. "Let's go get Hermione."

She didn't question it. Their hands came together in a bruising grip and Elara pulled Harriet through the frightened throng, chasing the Slytherins into the entrance hall—then slipping from the group along a side passage that would lead them to the girls' loo on the first floor. Harriet guessed no one had seen them because there wasn't an irate Defense professor breathing down their necks.

"Let's hurry," Harriet babbled, trying to sort through her panic without any luck. "We'll get Hermione and then—what? Should we go back to the dungeons alone? There's a bloody troll! Should we head higher, away from it?"

"We need to get back to the dorms before a head count is taken. We may be too late already." The grimness in Elara's voice caused Harriet's pulse to spike higher.

"What if we went to the library? Pretended we weren't even at the feast?"

"We were _seen_ , Harriet. Besides, the library closed after we left it."

"Shite," Harriet cursed. She was unable to think of any other plans because they had come upon the loo and were barging through the door. No ready sign of Hermione presented itself—but, over the harried rhythm of their breathing, Harriet heard a despondent sniffle, and she dashed to the only locked cubicle. "Hermione! Hermione!" Harriet slapped her palm upon the shut stall door. "Hermione, we need to _leave!_ "

"I told you I wanted to be alone!" came Hermione's tearful reply.

"Yes, but there's a _troll_ on the loose now and we very much need to get to the dormitories!"

A moment passed and Hermione unlocked the cubicle. In Harriet's original rush, she hadn't realized how terrible this loo smelled. Yes, it _was_ a loo, but the stench burned in Harriet's nose, in her throat, cloying as raw sewage and an unwashed body. Harriet, having been barred use of the shower by the Dursleys before, sadly had intimate knowledge of what the latter smelled like.

"A _troll_?" Hermione said in disbelief—then she, too, pressed a hand to her nose. "What _is_ that smell?"

"I don't know. I don't know how you can stand it—."

"That wasn't here before—."

A sudden lyrical chime emanated from Harriet's shirt and they both jumped. " _Misstresss!_ "

"What in the world was that?!"

The chime came again.

"I don't—."

Suddenly, Elara gasped. With a hand against her own chest, Harriet turned.

The smell, she discovered, oozed from the menacing creature now shouldering its way through the open doorway. It was tall, taller than Hagrid even, its body almost too massive to fit through the entrance, but Harriet's luck proved just as terrible as ever, because the troll—what else could it be?—managed to squeeze in. The lower portion of one leg was bigger than Harriet both in height and in width, one horny foot larger than her entire torso. Its bald head appeared comically small atop its towering, boulder-like frame, flanked in humongous ears that flapped when it faced them.

Harriet would've found it funny had the troll not been dragging a wooden club stained with old blood.

"Mary mother of God," Elara whispered, trembling. Harriet whipped out her wand—and Hermione screamed.

The troll shook its head, grunting when the sound echoed. It flailed and the club came crashing into the first cubicle, collapsing them together like flimsy paper cards. Harriet, Elara, and Hermione dove toward the line of sinks and barely avoided being smashed by the falling stalls. Splinters of wood bounced of Harriet's glasses.

Elara had her wand in hand too. " _Flipendo!_ "

A jet of blue light hit the troll in the chest—and did nothing.

"Trolls have thick hides exceptionally resistant to magic!" Hermione shrieked, the words barely intelligible in her hurry to speak. The troll must have felt something from the spell, however, because it scratched its gray chest and roared. The floor beneath the trio shook. They would never reach the door in time.

"Then what—?!"

The troll lifted its bloody club with surprising speed and brought it down towards them. Elara shouted. Harriet thrust her wand out and yelled, " _Protego!_ "

The club barreled toward their heads and bashed into Harriet's rippling ward—rebounding with incredible force, slamming into the wall, shattering the line of mirrors as the troll stumbled. Bits of glass rained upon them and the troll kicked one of the sinks in frustration. The pipes burst and doused the trio in frigid water.

Something shifted against Harriet's stomach, warmth slicing through the chill of the liquid, then—.

" _Livi_!"

Six feet of enraged snake flew across the bathroom floor as Livi threw himself toward the troll's wrinkled ankles. With a furious hiss, he sank his teeth into the creature's thick skin and the troll roared again, louder, its agony plain. It tried to smash Livi with the club and again Harriet threw her wand arm out, but she wasn't the only voice to shout this time.

" _Protego!_ "

The club struck the shield powered by all three witches and bounced to the ceiling. It hit the stones with enough momentum to crumble them, cracks spreading through the club and the mortar both, debris raining down on their bowed heads. "Livi!" Harriet cried, arms held out, and serpent surged into her embrace, coils whipping about her sopping body. The troll tipped to one side, dazed, and all three witches ran for the lives.

Out in the corridor, they heard the rapid _slap, slap, slap_ of approaching feet.

"Someone's coming!" Harriet hissed, hoping she spoke in English.

"Here!"

Elara's hand grabbed onto the back of her collar—yanking out no small amount of hair—and jerked Harriet toward a broom cupboard located just across the corridor from the loo. Hermione threw herself in and next came Harriet, squashed quickly between the two others as Elara pressed herself in and shut the rickety doors. The broom cupboard was _not_ big enough for the three of them.

"Ouch! Hermione, you just elbowed me right in the boob—!"

"Where did that snake come from?!" Hermione demanded, not arsed about giving Harriet bruises. "You—you what?! Just walk around with that—that—!"

"He's my familiar!"

"That's not an excuse! You don't see Elara with that owl of hers stuck under her blouse! That owl she hasn't even named yet!"

"Don't blame _me_ for Elara's weird owl. I think Livi's got separation anxiety."

"Snakes do _not_ get separation anxiety!"

"Will you two shut up?" Elara grunted. She had her hands braced on either wall to keep herself from being forcibly ejected out of the cupboard. The troll was trying to follow them now. They could hear it, shuffling about, groaning, every footfall thumping on the floor like a boulder crashing down from a mountaintop. Harriet wriggled until she could press one eye to a crack in-between the wall and the hinges. She could barely see through the scratched, filthy lens of her glasses, but part of the corridor—and the lumbering troll—was visible.

Her leg stung something fierce but Harriet ignored it.

"There it is!" said a voice—a _familiar_ voice.

"Is that _Neville_?" Hermione whispered. Elara shushed her.

It was indeed Neville; Longbottom and Weasley and Finnigan and Thomas. All four of the Gryffindor boys in their year stood in the corridor just within Harriet's sight, staring at the troll stuck halfway in and halfway out of the bloody loo. Sick burned the back of Harriet's throat when she realized Livi's bite was killing the creature, because its limited faculties were shutting down, beady eyes listless and bloody, lolling tongue fat in its gaping mouth.

"What's _wrong_ with it?" Ron asked aloud. Hermione's arm—had it always been wrapped around Harriet's waist? When did it get there?—tightened.

"Dunno," Longbottom replied, wand held at the ready, his stance firm. "I think it's…sick. None of the trolls I've seen looked like this."

"Was this all for nothing then?" Finnigan asked.

Neville shrugged. "Not totally. At least we found it, even if we didn't need to defeat it."

Snorting, Harriet muttered "Are they _serious_?" and earned another elbow to the torso.

" _If_ we could defeat it," Dean mumbled.

The troll groaned and thumped a useless arm on the floor.

"I told you, I've learned to deal with them. Merlin, must have spent a whole summer in those stupid, smelly mountains—."

"Look at it, it's huge!" Seamus sputtered.

A new voice spoke. "Yes, fully grown mountain trolls _are_ quite alarming in size, aren't they?"

The three witches stuffed into the cupboard heard the familiar—dangerous—crooning of Professor Slytherin and stiffened.

 _If he's here, he couldn't have done a head count in the dorms_ , Harriet's furiously working mind supplied. _Really, it hasn't been that long. He only had enough time to drop us off at the common room—we have to get back before he does, before someone realizes we're gone!_

Harriet could see that the professors had arrived, their approach covered by the Gryffindors arguing and the haggard breathing of the dying troll. Slytherin's face was as amicable as ever; that is to say, he wore a chilling smile that could strip flesh from bone and terrify men three times his age. Snape stood partly behind him, discreetly kneading his right hand, and behind _him_ came McGonagall. The Transfiguration professor sputtered in disbelief.

"In all my years—I've never—Mr _Longbottom_!" she thundered. Her brogue thickened. "What on _earth_ were you thinking?!"

"We defeated the troll," he said, throwing his shoulders back. The three shivering, dripping witches in the cupboard sucked in breaths and it was all Harriet could do to keep Hermione from bursting out of there shouting " _Like hell!_ " The bushy-haired girl did _not_ take kindly to others stealing credit for her work.

"Did you now?" Professor Slytherin said as he stepped around the troll to have a better look. The indolent creature grunted, flailed, and did nothing more. "Unless you're carrying around a deadly poison, Mr Longbottom, I highly doubt that."

Neville teetered, wand lowering, and though Harriet couldn't see his face she _could_ hear the uncertainty in his voice. "Poison?"

"Oh, yes. This troll's been poisoned. The water closet's a ruin, and yet…all four of your haven't a spot of dirt on you, aside from the usual first year filth."

"Really, Professor Slytherin," McGonagall said, tone as stiff as her back. "There's no need for that."

Slytherin waved a hand. "It appears, Minerva, your lions are not only _reckless_ but also _liars_."

Water began to overcome the loo threshold and flood the hall, seeping nearer the trailing edge of Slytherin's robes before he stepped aside. The water wasn't quick enough, however, to wash away the dark splotches of blood smeared across the stones, a speckled trail that led straight to the cupboard.

Snape's head turned as he followed the dots of red—until his gaze rose to stare at the rickety doors.

Harriet held her breath and was fairly certain the others did too.

"I think that'll be twenty points from Gryffindor," Professor Slytherin said. "Each."

The four Gryffindors gawked, pale and furious, McGonagall told Slytherin he was being too harsh—and Snape just stared at the cupboard. Harriet hoped with everything in her that he would look away, that someone would call his attention or the bloody troll would take a swing at him. _Anything_.

"Ah, it appears you've found our troll."

Dumbledore swept into view, trailed by Professors Sprout and Flitwick, who wrinkled their noses as they looked down at the half-dead mountain troll sprawled in the loo's doorway.

"Yes," Slytherin replied. "Your _noble_ Gryffindors here felt they had the wherewithal to challenge a mountain troll…but it appears someone beat them to it, as it were."

The Headmaster came nearer, water soaking the hem of his purple cloak as he bent over the troll's small head and inspected its bulging eyes. Livi's venom had worked quickly—and painfully. Harriet didn't much care that the creature that had tried to turn them into jelly was dying, but she did regret the suffering it had to endure. "You're right of course, Tom. Most peculiar. What do you make of this, Severus?"

Harriet didn't know whose name that was, but Dumbledore stared at Snape—and Snape stared at the cupboard with a wealth of emotions passing through his eyes like trains roaring in the underground: disbelief and rage, terror and relief.

"Severus?"

"I think we should do a bed check, Headmaster," Snape answered, voice hushed. "Just in _case_."

Hermione whimpered against Harriet's shoulder.

"An excellent idea!" Dumbledore straightened and turned his back to the cupboard, blocking Snape's sight of it, as well as Professor Slytherin's. "But, first, I believe our young adventurers here need to be returned to their fellows. Courage is an admirable trait, my dear boys, but it must be tempered with wisdom. Your grandmother writes to me quite often about your training abroad, Neville, and while I am most pleased to see you exercising and willing to share the knowledge you've acquired, you must remember that your classmates have not been exposed to the same trials and could have been severely injured. You could have _all_ been severely injured." His voice resonated with intensity and, for a moment, nobody spoke. "Do you understand?"

"Yes, Professor," the four boys mumbled. Harriet felt Elara's arms trembling from exertion. She wouldn't be able to hold herself up much longer.

"Good! I imagine Professor Slytherin has already given a fitting punishment…?"

"Eighty points taken," McGonagall said through clenched teeth. Harriet didn't know who she was more upset with: her Gryffindors or the Defense teacher.

"Well, then. How about we award twenty for good use of deduction? After all, they _did_ find the troll before us!" Dumbledore chuckled and straightened his spangled hat.

Slytherin scoffed. "Ridiculous."

"Minerva, if you would see your charges off…?"

Professor McGonagall departed, ushering the boys before her. They hadn't quite vanished before Harriet heard the professor's sharp, furious brogue chastising her students further.

"Pomona, Filius, I believe you should go on and check your own students." Sprout and Flitwick nodded and left. "Severus, Tom, I do believe we have a certain corridor that needs our attention. I will meet you there, after I secure our mountainous friend here."

"It's dead," Slytherin snapped. His voice became colder, harder, in the absence of other teachers or students. Harriet wasn't the only one to shrink herself in fear. "What's there to secure, Dumbledore?"

"Be that as it may, if you would honor an old man's request, _Tom_." Like Slytherin, the Headmaster's voice changed too, cool and uncompromising, a barest whisper of power threaded through his words like the silver stitching on his robes. Harriet couldn't believe Professor Slytherin's first name was _Tom_. It seemed so…so tame.

The Defense instructor seethed but did depart, swinging the hem of his robes out behind him as he stormed away. Not a second had passed after Slytherin's footsteps vanished when Snape darted toward the cupboard and Harriet jumped, terrified, only for Dumbledore to abort the Potions Master's movement with a steady hand and a quick word.

"Severus."

Snape sneered and shook the Headmaster off. He gave the cupboard one final burning glance before saying, "As you wish, Albus." He went after Slytherin, leaving Dumbledore alone with the dead troll and the steady stream of water gushing into the corridor. _If only he'd leave too,_ Harriet desperately thought. _If only this stupid night would end._

The Headmaster hummed to himself and stroked his beard, fingers pulling gently at the small tangles caught in the silver hair. The troll no longer drew breath. "Oh dear," Professor Dumbledore said aloud as he tipped his face toward the flat ceiling. "I do believe I am about to suffer from a spontaneous episode of sudden blindness and deafness. Dear me, I do think it will only last for a minute or so, however."

Harriet blinked. _He's not—he's not serious, is he? He couldn't be—_!

Apparently Elara thought he was, either that or her strength had finally given out, because her arms folded and the doors burst open, spilling three sodden witches and a hissing serpent onto the stone floor. Harriet gasped as her glasses skittered away through the water—then groaned when Hermione kneed her in the kidney in her rush to get up.

"Professor," Hermione said, breathless, seeming very near tears if the blotchy color of her face was any indication of her mood. "Professor, it's all my fault. I wasn't at the feast, and they were just trying to warn me—."

Elara picked bits of porcelain out her hair and glanced at Hermione. "Honestly, he wasn't even being subtle about _ignoring_ us—."

"But it's all my fault!" she wailed.

"The troll was meant to be in the dungeons!" Elara retorted. "Not here! That's what Professor Squirrel said!"

"Where are my glasses?" Harriet patted the flagstones but couldn't discern much beyond the toppled forms of brooms and upturned buckets.

"But you two could have been killed—or _expelled!_ Just because I was upset with Professor Selwyn—."

"I don't think this escape attempt is going well," Dumbledore mused. He bent down to pluck Harriet's glasses off the floor and gently dried them on his sleeve. "Here you are, Harriet." She fumbled to take the spectacles from his hand. "And his name is Professor _Quirrell_ , Miss Black, no matter what the older Slytherins might have told you."

Elara flushed.

Harriet stuffed the glasses onto her face. "Err, Professor?" She smeared wet hair and bits of stone out of her face as she chanced a look toward the Headmaster. Dumbledore wore a kindly expression as he surveyed her, blue eyes bright. Livi coiled himself about her neck like a living scarf, hissing obscenities Harriet had never heard before. Trolls didn't apparently taste very nice. "Can we have another go at that escape attempt?"

"Yes, I believe _one_ more attempt should suffice, don't you?"

The three Slytherin witches didn't need to be told again; Hermione grabbed Harriet's hand, towed her to her feet, twisted her fingers into Elara's sleeve, and they set out at a run while their Headmaster pretended to stare at the ceiling again.

None of them heard Dumbledore's gentle chuckling at their backs.


	22. the third floor corridor

_**xxii. the third floor corridor**_

Severus barely noticed the roaring over the sudden agony devouring his hand.

 _Not now,_ he snarled in the confines of his own mind as his fingers curled in upon themselves, nails digging into the fleshy mound of his palm, and Severus slammed his arm against one of the slick dungeon walls to reassert a measure of control over the limb. Weeks had passed without so much as a single twinge of pain—now this.

The roaring, he realized, was not the enraged shouting in his skull. No, it echoed in the narrow passages delving beneath the school, down deep into the perilous, untraveled oubliettes and locked chambers where the manacles still hung on the walls, the stones branded with runes long since consumed by time's avarice. The sound grew fainter, and as Severus straightened, a figure appeared in the green torchlight.

He sucked in a breath as another figure from another time overlaid itself on that youthful face, and he was torn between reaching for his wand and dropping to his knees. _Welcome, Severus…._

"Snape!" Slytherin snapped once his first attempts to get Severus' attention failed. " _Snape,_ the beast's above us now."

Severus straightened again, then nodded. The image in his mind faded. They whirled about and ran for the stairs, Slytherin quick to overtake him, but Severus let him go, not wanting to give the other man his back. After all, who would have the skills and wherewithal to let a bloody _troll_ into Hogwarts if not _Slytherin_? Snape didn't trust him—at all. Was this some kind of ploy? What was he up to now?

Minerva joined them in the entrance hall, appearing from the shallower dungeons where the kitchens and Hufflepuff dolts dwelt. The older witch was spry for her age and managed to keep up with Slytherin's demanding pace, the portraits following their progress through the empty corridors. The roaring had silenced itself.

Ahead, Severus heard a familiar and totally unwelcome voice.

 _Is that fucking Longbottom?_ he asked himself—and indeed, the three professors found Longbottom and his duped fellowship standing about like thrice-Stunned garden gnomes with their wands all but stuffed up their noses, as if they knew how to do _anything_ with them besides cast Tickling Charms or bloody Levitate. He didn't have to look at Minerva to feel the impetus of her fear and rage.

What caught Severus' eye was the troll itself, laying spread eagle on the floor caught halfway out the doorway to what looked like a girls' lavatory. For one nausea-inducing minute, Severus thought _Longbottom_ and his idiot groupies had downed the savage creature. How was that possible? He ignored Slytherin's sniping and Minerva's sputtering, ignored the four Gryffindors and studied the hulking mound of gray flesh, nostrils flaring against the foul odor.

Its skin lacked color naturally, but a new pallor had overtaken the thick folds of dry, mottled epidermis. Its movements were listless and automatic—twitches, really, the final impulses of a body giving way to a mind that could no longer control the heavy arms and stumpy legs.

"We defeated the troll," Longbottom proclaimed. _Arrogant little shite_.

"Did you now? Unless you're carrying around a deadly poison, Mr Longbottom, I highly doubt that."

Severus flattered himself in thinking he knew quite a bit about poisons. It was for this knowledge he'd been originally brought to the Dark Lord's attention, after all, and while Severus would always regret that decision, he wouldn't regret what he _learned_ while suffering Voldemort's unique brand of tutelage. He'd heard it said in the Muggle world that poison was the weapon of women—but in the Wizarding world, everyone knew poison was the tool of Slytherins.

This didn't manifest like a poison. A troll would have to ingest massive quantities of any toxic plant—and trolls were carnivorous by nature. They didn't eat plants, and most common poisons wouldn't present themselves in this manner. Aconite, for example, would induce sickness first, shut down the respiratory system, then attack the heart. Breathing difficulties were a common symptom among most harmful ingredients. The troll's tongue was swollen, the inside of its disgusting mouth blackening, the eyes swelling with blood. If Severus had to guess, he wouldn't guess poison. He'd say this was caused by—

 _Venom_.

Blood not belonging to the troll speckled the floor. Slytherin didn't notice it, not with his head stuffed so far up his own arse. None of the Gryffindors were hurt. They'd clearly arrived at the scene to find the troll half-dead and Longbottom decided to take credit—a reminder that had Severus grinding his teeth. The blood led away from them, across the passage to a…broom cupboard.

 _Venom. What kind of venom_ —?

A sudden recollection struck Severus dumb. " _Miss Potter, are you aware there is a highly venomous snake tucked into your bloody shirt?!"_

" _He's my familiar, Professor."_

His lungs burned for air but Severus couldn't bring himself to breathe past the knot in his throat. He thought he might literally spit fire, because if he didn't, he'd have to swallow it down and combust from the inside.

 _She wouldn't. She FUCKING WOULDN'T—_!

Albus was there and speaking to Severus. When the hell had the Headmaster arrived?

"Severus?"

"I think we should do a bed check, Headmaster," he whispered, too furious to speak. "Just in _case_."

He'd check Slytherin House himself. Severus didn't give a fuck if he wasn't Head anymore, that he hadn't been for years. He'd check the dorms and if Potter's spawn wasn't there, he'd wring her bloody neck himself for risking her fucking life! He'd make death by troll seem like a fluffy alternative to his rage. How _dare_ she!

Albus dismissed the others and, taking the sudden opportunity, Severus went for the cupboard only to have the Headmaster grab his arm. Albus squeezed with enough strength to break through the Potions Master's seething mood. Severus remembered that he had more to do here, a role to play, especially at this critical junction, and he couldn't lose his head.

Yet.

"As you wish, Albus."

Severus turned his back on the Headmaster and the dead troll and the broom cupboard. He sank his worries and speculations on the matter into the frigid stillness of his Occlumency shields, allowing the cold waters to overcome him inch by inch, quenching the spark of his fury, his terror, his uncertainty. He sent it all down into the abyss so that by the time he rejoined Slytherin in the entrance hall, his face was perfectly placid and his mind empty as a Gryffindor's skull.

"Well, this is a promising development," Slytherin said as he fell in step with Severus and the two wizards walked to the marble staircase.

"The prospect of students being crushed by a mountain troll is promising, is it?" Severus drawled in response.

The Defense teacher's lips curled in the mockery of a smile. "As if you'd mourn the loss of Longbottom."

Severus said nothing. No, he wouldn't miss Longbottom if the boy dropped dead, especially if he met a sticky end as a result of his own foolhardy stupidity, but only a sociopath like Slytherin—like Gaunt, like Voldemort, like _Riddle_ —would see children being crushed by a troll as just another hurdle to overcome. Only a sociopath like Slytherin would let a bloody troll into a school as a distraction.

They mounted the moving steps and Severus tapped the railing with his wand, sending the stairs upward toward the third floor. "You believe _he's_ taken the bait then…my Lord?"

"Naturally, Severus. He wouldn't be able to resist. After all, if anyone could understand Voldemort's mind, it would be _me_." Slytherin then shifted and removed his own wand from his sleeve. Not _his_ wand, of course, not in truth. His fingers traced the wand's the length and Severus heard the other wizard sigh.

He wisely chose not to comment.

The brazier kindled itself when he and Slytherin stepped from the stairs to the waiting corridor and paced to the final door. A simple lock of crude Muggle designed blocked the path and a thoughtless motion of Slytherin's hand opened the way. They entered the third floor antechamber. The silence resounded through the empty space.

There was nothing—no one—there.

Slytherin sucked air through his teeth, displeased. "What a _pity_."

Severus stood to the side as the other professor strode to the trap door situated in the room's middle. Slytherin flicked his wand in wordless incantation and the invisible wards came into relief, gold and crimson and blue, spiraling in meticulous nets of runes and old magic even Severus hadn't heard of before. This was Albus' work; the wards gleamed with purity, the same fragile purity the bled from a Patronus and filled up a person's heart with joy and relief and _love_.

An irked scoff left Slytherin as he stepped back from the ward, and Severus squeezed his eyes shut, holding tight to his Occlumency skills.

"No luck, then?" Dumbledore asked from the doorway. Severus spared a thought for how swiftly the Headmaster seemed to move through the school, but then again he was _Headmaster,_ and had been working at Hogwarts for far longer than Severus or Slytherin—in any iteration of self—had been alive.

The House of Serpents alumni didn't respond to Albus as he entered the chamber and quickly shut the door behind himself, the lock clicking home with a heavy _thunk_. Slytherin drifted from the trapdoor to a darker edge of the interior, the motion silent as ever, his wand still held in loose fingers. Severus watched him, and he watched the Headmaster as the elder wizard began to check his own wards.

"Ah!" Dumbledore said and Severus started. "Perhaps we had more luck than we thought."

Slytherin slid forward without another word. Albus smiled at him—smiled at him like how he used to smile at Severus in the early days, a cruel curve of pity and reservation begging stupid sinners to repent, to recede again into the Dark or burn themselves in his light. "Though, I take it you didn't catch that, did you, Tom? No, not when you close yourself to magic like this—the magic and the possibilities it holds."

"Enough of your pedantic prattling, old man," Slytherin spat. "Did someone attempt to breach the corridor or not?"

"Yes," Dumbledore replied without missing a beat. "It wasn't you, was it, Tom?"

Cracks began to appear in Slytherin's calm facade, hairline thin and not always visible, but Severus was adept in studying people and he could sense the angry snap of energy surrounding the Defense professor. Albus referred to him as " _Tom"_ constantly and consistently much to Slytherin's consternation, widening the cracks in his persona in an attempt to pour light on the nasty little creature hiding behind that handsome face.

Then Slytherin stilled himself and smiled.

"No. As you are well-aware, Dumbledore, _I_ have no need for the Philosopher's Stone."

Severus fought the urge to roll his eyes. No one _needed_ the bloody Stone; they simply _wanted_ it, wanted what it could offer, and Dumbledore knew Voldemort, that half-alive thing that mostly died exactly ten years ago that very evening, would want the Stone more than any other person in existence. It wasn't as difficult to understand the Dark Lord's mind as Slytherin supposed it to be. Truly, the desires of the power hungry were disgustingly myopic.

 _Who the fuck actually wants to live forever_?

No, the real question was _why_ Slytherin wanted Voldemort apprehended in the first place. Severus assumed it was because recruiting snotty little cretins to the Dark Arts became unquestionably more difficult when there was a mad Dark Wizard on the loose spreading anarchy, slaughtering Muggles and pure-bloods with little discrimination. The farther removed he was from all speculations on Voldemort, the more Slytherin legitimized himself, the more _trustworthy_ he became. The deadliest of fruits and lies tasted the sweetest, and the very worst poisons Severus had hidden in his stores were subtle things that did the worst damage long before the toll became detectable.

"Then we will suppose his agent has come to inspect the situation, at the very least. A _troll_. How very imaginative." Dumbledore stroked his beard. "Should he—or she—attempt to break my wards, they'll be sent into a nice cozy sleep. Unbreakable, of course, unless given the proper antidote." Here, he nodded at Severus with a look akin to pride. Severus wanted to sink into a hole and never be found.

Slytherin frowned. "He's not stupid, Dumbledore," he said as he gestured at the trapdoor. "Mad; yes, stupid; no. He might see through this…ruse. He might realize the Stone isn't being kept here. You are almost _too_ flagrant in flaunting the knowledge of its location. At the very least, he will be reticent to break wards he doesn't understand."

"I know. He won't try again until he feels more confident, but confidence is the armor of the wise man and the folly of the ignorant. Voldemort will lose patience and he _will_ try again. I know this. I know him." Half-moon spectacles gleamed in the low light. The look their venerable Headmaster bestowed upon Professor Slytherin could have made Hit Wizards weep. "I know _you_ , Tom."

"And you're just as predictable, _Albus_." Slytherin started for the door and unlocked it with a twitch of his hand. "We shall see how this unfolds and how far my assistance will extend. Come, Severus, we have a House to count heads in."

Severus—the well-heeled, if ill-mannered, dog that he was—followed him out of the chamber, though not without sharing a final glance with the Headmaster.

 _Watch him_ , said that searching look. _Watch him closely_.

As if there was another choice.


	23. come back for me

_**xxiii. come back for me**_

Pure luck saved the trio of Slytherin witches from being stopped and apprehended inside their own common room.

Harriet later learned that a Dungbomb spontaneously ignited in someone's bag and the foul smelling cloud of brown dust that burst from the satchel drew the crowded room's attention like moths to a particularly stinky flame. Harriet, Hermione, and Elara didn't notice the smell, not after tangling with a mountain troll, so they barely acknowledged the cloud or the shrieks or the general rabble as they passed through the entrance in the stone wall and all but dashed to their dorm room.

No one else was inside. With all the excitement of feast and troll incursion, the five other first year girls were mostly likely in the common room with everyone else, chatting and theorizing, waiting for more information. Elara was the first to sink into a boneless heap, wheezing in a way that worried Harriet, and Hermione followed suit, crumpling on her bed as she massaged a stitch in her side.

Rock dust and porcelain debris covered them from head to foot, shavings from the mirror gleaming like stars in Elara's disheveled hair and grime patterned in nervous fingerprints across Hermione's face. Livi slid from Harriet's shoulders with a sullen, tired complaint. She sat on the edge of her bed and hissed in pain.

"Harriet—," Hermione panted. "You're—you're bleeding!"

She was. Something in the loo had cut her calf from ankle to knee, the slice shallow but long, ruining both her sock and the hem of her uniform's skirt. "Bloody hell," Harriet groused as she thumbed the shredded threads. She hadn't bought many uniforms, anticipating—hoping, _hoping_ —she'd grow taller and have to get more before the start of next year.

"Really, Harriet!" Hermione said, her voice several octaves too high. "Your language is terrible—." Then the bushy-haired girl dove into her trunk and threw aside sweaters and cloaks and more books than Harriet could count, emerging at last with a little zippered Muggle satchel she opened to reveal a handful of plasters, a wrinkled roll of gauze, and a tube of ointment. She disappeared into the washroom and returned with a dampened towel.

"I'm fine, really, you don't need to—," Harriet stuttered through chattering teeth, but Hermione wouldn't hear of it. She made quick work of cleaning the blood and grit off the affected skin, applying plasters to keep the cut closed before they both wound the gauze around Harriet's twig-like leg.

"You two could have been killed!" Hermione lectured under her breath. Silence had been thick in the room ever since their heavy breathing had subsided. "Such an utterly insensible thing to do!"

"I tried telling a teacher!" Harriet huffed. "But they ran off after the troll! And Slytherin wouldn't listen!"

"And so you just gave up?!"

"Well, someone had to come get you!" Harriet's voice rose to match Hermione's in pitch. "I wasn't going to let my best friend go wandering with that big buggering thing stomping about! It could have killed you!"

"You—." Hermione was suddenly reduced to tears. Harriet felt ill, unsure of what to do when clear, glistening streaks cut through the dirt on the other girl's cheeks. "Y-y-you came back for _me._ " She whirled on Elara, who flattened herself against the door again, wide-eyed and startled, like one of Mrs Figg's cats when she'd corner it for a brushing. "And _you_. I never—. You—. _You_ came for me, too! And I thought you didn't even like _me_."

Elara's pale face turned brilliant red in color and she fidgeted with her sleeves. It was a nervous tick Harriet had noticed before; Elara tugged her cuffs down toward her hands or straightened her collar, making sure the top button remained closed, and Harriet knew she'd wear gloves if the professor would let her get away with it. "I…of course I like you. I know it doesn't seem that way. I just—. I'm not…not good with…people." She kept her gaze on her hands as she wrung them together. "The…the people who…the _place_ that raised me, they didn't—." A shuddering sigh escaped and she squeezed her eyes shut. " _Of course_ I like you. You and Harriet are my friends. My only friends."

Hermione stood and hesitated for the briefest of instances before she went to Elara and gave the other girl a hug. Elara became rigid as a board, clearly unaccustomed or uncomfortable with the touch, and yet she pushed aside her own misgivings to lay a tentative hand on Hermione's shoulder.

Harriet smiled. Her cheeks ached from the strength of it and her eyes felt wet behind her scratched glasses. She didn't look away.

"I'm being silly," Hermione said with a broken chuckle as she used her sleeve to wipe her face. "I didn't mean to cry, how ridiculous—." She hunted through her pockets for a sodden tissue when she stepped back from Elara—who visibly deflated in relief—and happened to clap eyes on Livi again. "Harriet…is that the Horned Serpent from the Magical Menagerie? The one they reported _stolen_?"

Elara only quirked a brow.

"I _didn't_ steal him," Harriet replied, hoping the two other witches believed her. Neither appeared wholly convinced and Harriet ground her teeth. "I _didn't_! I went into the shop and we had a little chat—apparently I'm a Parseltongue or, err, a _Parselmouth_ , like Professor Snape said—and I got shooed out by the shop owner. Livi showed up in my room later and told me he didn't want to go back and I told him he _had_ to go back, and then he kind of pinned me down and I couldn't think of _how_ I'd go about getting a big snake back into the store—."

Harriet knew she was rambling but couldn't stop. Elara, who'd be there in the Menagerie and had heard Harriet talking, wasn't surprised by her snake chatting ability; Hermione reacted much like Snape, her expression cycling through various degrees of disbelief and shock. "Holy _cricket_. You can speak to snakes?"

"Yes—? But you can't say anything! I told Snape I wouldn't mention it to anyone else and he—." _Might give me detention until the next century? Seems that kind of bloke._

"That's incredibly rare," Hermione said. "According to _Hogwarts: A History_ , Salazar Slytherin himself was a Parselmouth—it's the reason our House symbol is a snake! And it's a _hereditary_ talent, which is why Professor Slytherin is a Parselmouth too—."

"Professor Slytherin's a Parselmouth?"

"He would have to be. Some of the, um, books speculate on the legitimacy of his claim to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Slytherin because he simply couldn't have been _born_ a Slytherin, as the family went extinct in the male line centuries ago—."

"Hermione—."

"—and the Gaunts became the last direct family, with the Minister claiming to be the final living member of the House—."

"Really, Hermione—."

"—so Slytherin would have to display a magical hereditary trait such as that for his claim to be rectified by the Wizengamot, not that any of the records make note of that. Shortsighted of them, really. Harriet, you're most likely related to him!"

Harriet wrinkled her nose. _Maybe that's why Professor Snape warned me not to say anything_. Something about Professor Slytherin seemed off to Harriet, something she couldn't name or really put a finger on, especially since he was always cordial with her, praised her Defense abilities, and was Head of Slytherin House. His presence…aggravated Set, riled her shadow when no one was looking, and Harriet didn't like how he grimaced at the Gryffindors and ignored Hermione. She already had enough terrible relatives, thank you very much.

A sudden bang hit the door and all three witches jumped.

"Professor Slytherin's doing a head count in the common room in five minutes! Be ready!" Prefect Farley called. Harriet, Hermione, and Elara looked at one another—then at their filthy, rumpled uniforms and dripping robes.

"Oh, _no_ —!"

" _Shite!_ "

"Oh, we're going to be—!"

"Don't say it— _!_ "

" _Expelled!_ "

"Will you two move—!"

Trunk lids clattered against the ends of their beds as the three girls grappled for any clothes they could, Elara disappearing into the bath where she typically changed while Hermione and Harriet tore off their robes and vests to jam jumpers on over their heads. Harriet used her dirty shirt to hastily clean her face and hands, then found a pair of new socks that mostly covered the gauze on her sore leg. She shoved her shoes onto the wrong feet in her haste and almost collided with Hermione when they both bolted for the door. Elara joined them then, her hair once more collected in a bun, her appearance much fresher than Harriet's.

The Slytherin common room was a long, sunken space built beneath the lake, windows set to look out into the black tide, the hearths gone dark and cold despite the number of people congregating on the plush couches and winged armchairs. The House of Serpents was the smallest House at Hogwarts despite the contrary size of Harriet's own year; sixth and seventh year girls often left Hogwarts early, content to marry with their O.W.L.s alone and lead their lives, pure-bloods marrying other pure-bloods to make pure-blood mums and dads and relatives happy. Some of the older girls, like Gemma Farley, sneered when someone asked if she was going to follow the same tradition, and disparaged those "unambitious twits" who did.

That left sixty or so students to mill about the room, their anticipation politely subdued but still palpable, like static clinging to the surface of a well-kept cashmere scarf. The eldest Slytherins intimidated Harriet so she didn't know much about them; they took the best seats by the best hearths, gleaming in the lowlight like cut gems, and those that crowded their sides reminded Harriet an awful lot of Dudley's snotty friends—if better bred. They looked and spoke like adults, not like children, with posh "r"s and "h"s, House rings on their fingers and practiced smirks at their lips.

"This way—," Hermione whispered once they exited the dorm corridor and came into the throng. "We'll just stand back here—."

Hermione quickly dragged Harriet and Elara to the farthest edge of the common room, where the light was the weakest and the temperature plummeted several degrees. Harriet's teeth started chattering again—though whether from cold or apprehension, she didn't know. Elara gripped her hand and Hermione gripped the other as they hunched their shoulders and waited for what would happen.

Professor Slytherin appeared less than a minute later. He strode from the dim passage that held the hidden wall entrance, silent as one of the ghosts when he walked, Professor Snape like a sure-footed cat at his side—a large, predatory and undeniably furious cat towering over Slytherin and the students. Harriet stared at the floor and gulped.

"Well, we've certainly had an interesting evening, haven't we?" Slytherin said, earning several genteel snickers out of the oldest students. They looked at Slytherin with something like adoration in their eyes and it made Harriet a bit queasy for reasons she wasn't sure of. "Yes, yes— _funny_ , isn't it?" Something in Slytherin's tone shifted, indicating that no, nothing was _funny_ about his words. " _Funny_ to waste _my_ time with a troll hunt through the castle. _Funny_ to endanger the lives of Slytherins— _funny_ to spoil a perfectly good Samhain those of you with half a brain would have used to prepare your best ingredients and rituals, or have you not be _paying attention_ while attending this school?"

Hardly a breath could be heard. Slytherin always spoke louder than Snape did but he needn't have bothered; he could've muttered and it would have resounded among the students gathered there. "Professor Snape will call names by year. If you are not prompt in answering, you will be _ver_ y sorry indeed."

Snape didn't need a list; he said the names from memory, and with each "present, sir!" Harriet watched his thumb tap against a fingertip as the professor counted in his head. He spat "Potter" like poison and, when he glowered at her, Harriet knew they hadn't fooled the Potions Master for an instant. The man was too clever for his own good.

"He knows," Elara whispered to the floor, her lips barely moving as Snape finished off the role call.

"He can't—not for sure," Hermione responded. "There's nothing that could prove we were there—."

"Except her knows about Livi, and he knows Longbottom didn't poison the bloody troll, and he _knows_ someone was in the broom cupboard, even if he can't _prove_ it—."

"Sh—!"

Slytherin dismissed the crowd. They made for the dorms, moving as swiftly as they could, but three first years didn't have the same presence as their older counterparts, so Harriet, Elara, and Hermione were shoved to the back of the dwindling line. Snape was on them the instant Slytherin turned to the common room entrance and disappeared.

"Potter," he said, voice low, eyes flashing as he leaned forward and the three girls froze. "Black, Granger. Don't think for an instant I'm fooled—."

"We _weren't_ there. There's no proof—sir," Harriet told him. The statement came out much braver than Harriet felt, which was good, because Snape only paled further in his fury.

"Oh no? No _proof_? Perhaps I should bring a certain _reptile_ to the Headmaster's attention then, hm?" Snape snarled.

Harriet blinked, because that was an empty threat and she hadn't realized Snape _gave_ empty threats. Dumbledore had plainly seen Livi in the corridor and hadn't breathed a word of protest, so either the Headmaster knew about the snake already or the professor'd told him.

"If _any_ of you do something half as brain dead _ever_ again, I'll personally see to it that you'll be dissecting toads and scrubbing cauldrons for the duration of your stay at this school. I don't need _proof_ , Potter, and you're a fool to suggest otherwise. Am I understood?"

Eyes on the floor, they nodded.

"Get out of my sight."

The congestion in the corridor had cleared during Snape's brief tirade, so the trio managed to slip by him and disappear with minimal fuss. Harriet's chest ached like she hadn't taken a breath in several minutes and now that she had, the air burned in her throat, in her lungs, and rendered her limbs as listless as cooked noodles. Dread and relief mixed in her head, and a single thought burst through the morass with startling clarity.

 _He didn't threaten to expel us_.

"You know," Harriet murmured as they approached the door to their dormitory. Pansy's grating voice was audible just inside. "Tonight wasn't so bad. I've had worse Hallowe'ens!"

Hermione buried her face in her hands. Elara shook her head and looked toward the ceiling.

"Honestly, Harriet…."


	24. curse thy enemies

_**xxiv. curse thy enemies**_

November landed with all the subtlety of a firecracker being lobbed into the middle of a silent church.

Those born and bred in the Wizarding world had been ticking off the weeks and days in rampant anticipation of the Quidditch season's beginning, and they couldn't wait for the first match between Slytherin and Gryffindor slated for later that very month. The blood fanaticism and constant sneering about Muggle-borns abated in the common rooms and classes in favor of talk about favorite teams and prospective winners. Slytherin hoped to take the Quidditch Cup for the sixth year in the row.

Of course, Harriet knew very little about Quidditch, only what she'd learned in Diagon Alley and from listening to some of the more talkative boys wax poetic about player statistics and famous maneuvers—but she found the enthusiasm infectious. Hermione thought it was silly; she told Harriet a whole list of grievances against sports in general as Harriet helped her carry books out of the library, and every time Elara so much as glimpsed a broomstick, she turned a bit green.

Nevertheless, both girls followed Harriet out into the bracing November chill as the school made their way to the Quidditch pitch.

"I just don't see the point," Hermione grumbled as a Gryffindor running by almost clipped her in the head with a flapping pennant. "I don't see why people are so _mad_ over such a silly thing."

"Because it's _magic_!" Harriet replied. "I still can't believe you two hate brooms. They're a lot of fun!" She thought so, at least. She'd only been on a broom twice: at the very first flying lesson and at the very last. Madam Hooch had been reticent to let her into the air at all after she punched Ron.

Speaking of whom—

Harriet caught a flash of red hair as they climbed the steps into the stands with the rest of the students and paused. "Err, we're not on the Gryffindor side are we?" she asked as she glanced behind her at Elara and Hermione. They both shared puzzled shrugs.

"How should we know?"

"Well, I guess we're going to find out…."

The stands, of course, didn't have any official form of categorization, but the trio of Slytherin witches did end up seated in a mass of Gryffindors with a scattering of yellow scarf wearing Hufflepuffs and a few older Ravenclaws who didn't look all that excited to be there. Harriet plunked herself down on a bench without care and dragged in a lungful of cold air as Hermione and Elara sat down as well.

"What are _you_ doing here?" one of the Gryffindors in their year—Seamus—asked as he twisted in his seat to glare at them. "Why aren't you sitting with the rest of the Slytherins!"

Besides the fact that Harriet hadn't seen where the majority of her House had migrated, she had little interest in hanging around those of her own year. Some were all right. Theo Nott was a bit like Hermione in regards to studying and could be courteous, though he could also jump onto Draco's Muggle-hating bandwagon quick enough when it suited him. Daphne Greengrass also adopted "pure-blood politeness," as Harriet thought of it. They were nice enough not to make themselves look like total arses, though Malfoy never had the same compunction.

An entirely different dynamic ruled the Gryffindors. Thanks to her magical foster family, Hermione was a walking encyclopedia on Wizarding families, and so Harriet knew Seamus was a half-blood and Dean Thomas was a Muggle-born and three of the Gryffindor girls—Parvati Patil, Lavender Brown, and Fay Dunbar—were all pure-bloods of varying "purity," while Fay's friend Gretta Meadowes was a Muggle-born and Sophie Roper was a half-blood. Ron and Neville were both considered "blood traitors." None of those in the House of Lions ever seemed to care about that, though.

 _That's because it doesn't matter_ , Harriet reminded herself as she glanced between Elara and Hermione. Elara was a pure-blood—supposedly, because all Blacks were supposedly pure-blood, though Elara fiercely ignored all questions regarding her family no matter who they came from. Harriet didn't begrudge her that silence since she herself was just as tight-lipped about her home life. Hermione was a Muggle-born and had to be the top in their year, she was just so dead clever. _It doesn't matter_.

"I'm here to watch Quidditch," Harriet said stiffly, meeting Seamus' glare. "There's no _assigned_ seating."

Seamus opened his mouth and Ron—with clumsy red and gold stripes painted on his cheeks—elbowed him in the ribs. "Leave off, Seamus! You're going to miss it!"

Harriet wondered what he meant by that because it wasn't likely he'd miss an entire Quidditch match before it even began—or maybe it was, what did she know? She sat straight and stared out across the grassy expanse of the pitch. The voice of the commentator, a Gryffindor boy Harriet didn't know, boomed from the staffing stands visible in the periphery of Harriet's vision.

"And here comes this year's Slytherin team: Chasers Flint, Pucey, Montague, Keeper Bletchley, Seeker Higgs, Beaters Derrick and Bole! Flint back again as captain as well, even after some blatant examples of cheating last season—."

" _Jordan!_ " came McGonagall's voice, distant but still sharp. The Slytherin team walked from their locker room with their brooms balanced on their shoulders, and the greener part of the stands— _so that's where the other Slytherins went_ —burst into applause.

"Now the Gryffindor team—! Keeper Wood, extraordinary captain there—Beaters George and Fred Weasley, couple of Bludgers themselves those two, Seeker Alicia Spinnet, Chasers Angelina Johnson, Katie Bell, and—new to the team this year—Neville Longbottom!"

Harriet froze.

The stands erupted in cheers and shouts and bouts of chanting, though it couldn't quite drown the tremendous, echoing "boo" that roared out of the Slytherins. Ron and the other Gryffindors must've already known about Neville's placement on the team because they showed no surprise, only blatant enthusiasm as they jumped to their feet whistling and yelling Neville's name.

"But first years aren't allowed brooms or to try out for the House teams," Hermione said as a furrow dug its way between her brows. "That's against the rules. It's hardly fair."

"Like Professor Snape said," Harriet told her, her own enthusiasm dulled. "'Life's hardly fair.'"

"Lighten up, Potter." Ron dropped onto his seat again. He was breathless from cheering, though that didn't stop the rest of Gryffindor from continuing as the teams met Madam Hooch on the field. "We're all a bit jealous of Neville, but that's no reason to get yourself in a snit about it."

Harriet bit her own tongue. Jealous of Neville? Yes, Harriet decided she _was_ mostly likely jealous of Longbottom—though not over something as silly as Quidditch. Truth be told, she wished she'd gotten more of a chance to fly during their lessons, but she had only herself to blame for being grounded. Her jealousy toward Longbottom stemmed from the fact that, though war had touched his life just as it had touched Harriet's, he came out of it almost wholly unscathed. Harriet longed for the family she'd lost so long ago and would never know.

"Quiet, Weasley," Elara snapped, causing the red-head to jump.

"No one's talking to you, Black!" Finnigan put in.

"No one's talking to _you_ , either, Finnigan."

Out on the field, the two teams were mounting their brooms and rising into the air. They ascended much faster and far higher than Harriet's year had with Madam Hooch, and Harriet shoved aside her immature distaste for Longbottom to watch. The older students handled their brooms with obvious skill, flying like they'd been born on a broomstick, steering with their knees and hips, relying very little on their hands. After all, they needed their hands free once the Quaffle and the Bludgers and the Snitch were set loose.

"That's called Checking," Harriet said when one of the Slytherin Chasers—Pucey—darted between Johnson and Longbottom just as they passed the Quaffle between them, snatching it from Longbottom's fingers before darting in the other direction. "And that, well—." Flint threw an elbow into Bell's face. "Well that's called Cobbing."

"Where do you learn this, Harriet?" Hermione asked, confused.

"I have to read something while you're in the library studying."

"You're supposed to be _studying,_ too."

"I am!" Harriet shrugged. "Just not what you thought I was."

Hermione scoffed, scandalized, and Elara snorted into her scarf.

The game continued at high speeds. Harriet had to admit Neville seemed to have some skill at the game. He flew with aggressive confidence despite his relatively small size and fronted several Hawkshead Attacking Formations—which involved the three team Chasers coming together like an arrowhead and flying with speed to force other Chasers aside.

That said, Longbottom didn't appear to cooperate well with Johnson and Bell. A few times they waited at his flanks, open for a pass, and Neville would just barrel forward through the Slytherin offense like no one else was even playing. The louder the crowd yelled his name, the more reckless he became. Watching him, Harriet didn't feel quite so jealous. She'd rather be set on fire than let her head get that swollen.

Her attention wavered until Ron yelled, "There's something wrong with Neville!" sounding terrified.

"Yeah, it's called being a prat—." Harriet turned her gaze from watching Flint lob the Quaffle toward a goal and found Longbottom higher in the air than he'd been before. Bell and Johnson circled below him with apparent apprehension, and when one of the Weasley Beaters tried to get closer, Longbottom rose even higher. He had both his arms wrapped tight about the broom, his hands white on the haft as it quivered and rolled.

"There's something wrong with his broom," Elara corrected Ron, her pale eyes following Longbottom's twitchy ascent. The broom rolled again and jerked forward, the motion not unlike the hard flick a person might give their hand after they burn it or jam a finger, like they're trying to throw the pain from themselves. Neville clutched to handle harder and shouted wordless alarm to the Chasers below him. The Slytherins were taking full advantage of the distraction to freely score points.

Seamus took note of this too. "Why haven't they called the match?!" he shouted with anger. "What are they doing—?!"

A whistle blew and barely cut through the rising din of watching spectators. The broom bucked harder and rose sharply, bringing Neville a good fifty or sixty feet above the pitch. The Slytherin team were forced to the ground, none looking pleased, as Madam Hooch retrieved her wand and flicked it toward Longbottom. Nothing happened.

"Harriet—," Hermione said in a voice loud enough to be heard by her alone. Harriet tore her eyes from Longbottom's peril when her friend jerked on her arm, and Hermione pointed toward the higher staffing section of the stands. "I think—I think it's _Professor Snape!_ "

 _Snape?_ The professor was difficult to pick out of a crowd; he was distinct one on one, but in a group of other professors and guests and shopkeepers from Hogsmeade all dressed in drab winter cloaks, he blended in. Harriet could only see the profile of him and he looked to be speaking very quickly, thin lips in constant motion. "What about him?"

"I think he's…." Hermione's voice dropped lower still and Harriet had to bend her neck so she could hear the other girl. "I think he's _cursing the broom!_ "

"What?!" Harriet squawked.

Hermione gripped her wrist and rushed on. "He hasn't broken eye contact once, not _once_ , and he must have his wand out, and—."

"I know he's not the nicest bloke, but he wouldn't!" Harriet glanced at Professor Snape again and he still hadn't broken eye contact. Her stomach twisted. "I mean, he's right out in the open there, sitting with a bunch of teachers, and if _we've_ noticed him staring, I think better witches and wizard would have too, right?"

Hermione pressed her mouth into a thin line. "But—."

The bucking broom became too much for Neville; it heaved, then threw itself forward, and the Boy Who Lived came sliding right off the end. The crowd screamed and Harriet gasped, horrified, as Longbottom plummeted toward the earth, going too fast, flipping end over end like a limp ragdoll—.

" _Levicorpus!_ "

Much too close to the ground, Professor Slytherin—standing at the head of the teacher's box, wand extended—shouted a spell that broke through the din and caught Neville by the ankle. The boy's descent slowed all at once, as if he had a noose wrapped tight about his leg, and the bones gave with a loud _crack!_ Harriet winced. Otherwise, Longbottom hung suspended, unharmed, a few feet above the pitch. His teammates jumped off their brooms and raced toward him. The Gryffindors in the stands did the same, and Harriet caught an elbow to the ear when she didn't move quick enough for Finnigan.

"That was…eventful," Harriet muttered as she rubbed her head. Hermione still had her lips pursed as she stared off toward the higher staffing seats. Snape stood as well, though he didn't make for the field. He seemed to be thinking very hard, wand in hand, brow low.

"It was Snape," Hermione said for Elara's benefit. She kept herself mindful of the trailing Gryffindors around them, but no one was paying attention to the three first year witches. Elara blinked. "He was cursing Longbottom's broom."

"We don't _know_ that," Harriet told her. The last thing Harriet wanted was for a rumor about Snape trying to off Neville to get out and trace its way back to them. Snape might _really_ try to kill a student then. "He's a teacher, Hermione! You love teachers!"

Hermione flushed. "I know! But what else could he have been doing? I've studied curses, Harriet, and you _have_ to maintain eye contact, and Snape—."

"It could have been a counter-curse," Elara said, cutting Hermione off. The bushy-haired witch jerked as if shocked. "Both need constant eye contact. But I wouldn't put it past Snape. He can be quite foul."

He could. The acerbic attitude of the Potions Master rarely extended toward the Slytherins, and yet they still felt the backlash of it, and Elara's explosive ineptitude at the subject earned her just as many biting comments as any Gryffindor. Harriet he mostly ignored and Hermione sometimes even won points for her perfect brews.

"He wouldn't," Harriet said again, though her heart wasn't in the statement. "It's…not very Slytherin—and Professor Slytherin himself saved Neville!"

"He has that nasty grin of his on though," Elara muttered. "Maybe he and Snape are playing a game of terrify the Gryffindor?"

They couldn't be certain. As Oliver Wood began shouting about sabotage and the Slytherin Quidditch players denied all allegations of foul play, Harriet, Hermione, and Elara remained sitting on the cold benches and wondered who had tried to kill the Boy Who Lived.


	25. eye of newt

**_xxv. eye of newt_**

Sooner than anyone expected, the holidays arrived at Hogwarts.

Severus both loved and loathed the Yule time; the miscreants returned home to their doting families, leaving the castle blissfully silent, but he rarely had the opportunity to enjoy that silence between resupplying Pomfrey's infirmary and dealing with the Headmaster's well-meaning—and unwanted—Christmas cheer. Severus would languish in the lab, frozen through by the highland winter, and his hand would inevitably ache to the point of distraction. Dumbledore would ask "How are you, my dear boy?" and Snape would snarl, bitch, and most likely drink too much at the yearly feast just to sleep through the night.

He didn't expect this year to be different—not until Prefect Farley flounced into his office the afternoon before the train was set to head to London and handed him the list of students staying behind.

Slytherins rarely lingered for the break. The occasional N.E.W.T student would remain, intent on escaping irascible relatives and utilizing the school's quiet to study, and both Slytherin and Snape would have difficulty prying them away from their books long enough to stuff food into their mouths. One name was hastily jotted on the list this year, as if the writer had done so unwillingly, looking over their shoulder to see if the other students were watching. Severus recognized Harriet Potter's untidy scrawl.

The parchment bent and twisted under his fingertips. He pushed the roiling mass of dread into the back of his mind and refused to acknowledge it.

Severus saw her the next day. He stood by a drooping Sinistra in the entrance hall as the little monsters flocked through the castle's doors dressed in Muggle-garb and dragging their luggage. The sun managed to break free of the winter clouds and spilled upon the stone floor, glittering in the bits of snow drifting on the morning breeze, the smell of fresh rain and pine disgustingly refreshing. The brightness burned Severus' eyes and he rubbed at them, aggravated.

Potter was one of the only students wearing school attire. She came out of the dungeon corridor with Granger and Black, the latter pair dragging their trunks, the Granger chit talking much too fast if the speed of her moving mouth was anything to go by. It was the only time of year Muggle-borns could return to the Muggle world thanks to that ridiculous law passed by Gaunt, so Severus knew where Granger was headed, but he didn't know where Black was going, why she was opting to leave her supposed friend alone for the holidays.

Why the hell is the girl not going back to Petunia for the break? He'd asked himself the same question in his office. It kept bobbing up in his head like flotsam after a storm, the "why" like the incessant dripping of a leaking faucet over a sink that wouldn't drain. Why, why, why—drip, drip, drip. Severus had an answer—one of many, he told himself, one of many—and it threatened to come into focus at every turn, but he ignored it, buried himself in his own Occlusion, because the general consensus among the staff was students who remained during the holidays weren't typically happy at home. Severus didn't want to think about why Potter might not be happy at her own.

You're a freak, Lily! A freak!

"Long night, Severus?" Albus asked as he came to stand by the Potions Master. The light blue of his robes reflected the soft color of the sky visible through the shredded clouds and snowflakes made of threads coalesced along the wide sleeves, dripping and dissipating only to repeat the action again and again.

"Your robes are ridiculous," Severus grumbled in lieu of answering. By the doors, Granger jerked Potter into an strangling embrace and Black followed suit before they made for the exit with the rest of the departing mass. Potter waved goodbye, glum. Severus' gaze drifted through the hall and came to rest on another remnant who would be plaguing the corridors this holiday.

"Tell me Longbottom isn't staying," he said, glaring at the idiot boy as if his stare alone could burn through him. Longbottom stood with his Weasley cohort at the bottom of the marble staircase, leaning on the newel post, and neither were dressed to leave. When Dumbledore didn't reply, Severus had to bite back a groan. "For Salazar's sake—."

"Molly and Arthur Weasley are out of country visiting Charlie and so their other boys are remaining with us for the holidays. Neville expressed worry to Frank over his friend and asked to stay behind," the Headmaster explained with an idle shrug that only further pissed Severus off. "It's a noble sentiment, Severus."

Snape didn't unleash the verbal tide of swear words churning in his gut, but it was a near thing. "He's a wretched, arrogant brat, Albus. He has a team of Aurors watching his home and enough wards to satisfy Gringotts; why remain, especially after that debacle on the Quidditch pitch? For Weasley? It's not as if he's in danger."

"It can be difficult to leave behind those we care about. Impossible in moments of crisis, and sometimes wholly irrational, but who are we argue against the sentiment? All we can do is watch over them and ensure their safety."

Severus' attention flickered back to the girl. She still stood watching the backs of her friends dwindle into the distance and he felt a fresh stab of anger toward Black, because if Neville fuckwit Longbottom could stay behind for bloody Weasley, why couldn't Black remain for the girl? She was alone in the dungeons and if Voldemort had an agent in the school, someone intent on the Stone, someone intent on Longbottom, was it possible some fragment of the Dark Lord's twisted mind would recognize her? Realize the truth—?

Slytherin came sauntering out of the underground passage and Severus sneered, ducking his head so his hair swung forward and obscured the direction of his sight. The Defense professor paused by the Potter girl and Snape felt more than saw Albus stiffen, a sudden rigidity falling over the older wizard when Slytherin scrutinized the short, strange girl with her wild hair and haunted eyes, and brought his fingers together in thought. He said something to her, something lost in the distance and din of running feet, and the girl stirred, blinking as she looked up at her Head of House. Slytherin spoke again and Potter made her excuses, dashing off into the dungeons once more.

It was difficult to tell from the angle, but Severus thought Slytherin looked…curious.

"Forgive me if my worry doesn't extend to Longbottom at the moment," he drawled, leaving his place by the wall. Albus said nothing.

 **xXxXx**

Ten students in total had been left in their charge during the Yule holiday. It was a simple task to count them during lunch, scattered at their respective tables as they were, the House of Lions making up half that number. Three Weasleys sat clumped with the Longbottom boy and made a disproportionate amount of noise, earning several pointed looks from Minerva and one scolding rebuff from the remaining Weasley, Percy.

At the Hufflepuff table, first year Susan Bones sat affably chatting with third year Randy Twilfitt. Severus guessed Bones' aunt was too busy with the Ministry and Twilfitt's father was probably inundated by end of the year orders. The friendliness exhibited by the Hufflepuffs didn't extend to the neighboring table; the two seventh year Ravenclaws, Wendell Henge and Felipe Sanders, sat at opposing ends of the hall and shot one another bitter, harried looks, both slumped over open texts, hands grubby with dust and ink. The pair exhibited the stereotypical competitiveness that plagued Filius' house and Severus imagined they'd come to blows like a pair of tired Muggle thugs before long.

Finally, there was Potter, of course, sitting on her own and picking at her sandwich, gazing morosely at the delicate decorations that had sprung up in the castle only that morning. Pitiful sight that she was, Potter attracted the notice of other professors aside from Severus. Pomona leaned nearer Minerva and he heard her mutter. "Poor dear. Black and the Granger girl didn't stay? Why didn't her family have her come home?"

Minerva pressed her lips into a firm line and she surveyed Harriet—who not so subtly dropped part of her sandwich into her lap for that invisible snake of hers to eat. "They must have been busy."

The Herbology professor hummed around a bite of potatoes. "I still remember her parents well. Tragic thing, what happened. Who did their girl get left with after 81'?"

"Relatives of hers."

Pomona frowned, the look unnatural on her well-mannered face. "I didn't know James had folk about still."

Then Minerva quickly tucked into her soup and changed the conversation. Pomona would know any relatives of Lily's to be Muggles and that was not something Dumbledore or those who had even the slightest inkling of what really happened that Hallowe'en so long ago wanted others privy to. The girl had been left with Petunia—with Muggles—despite the law prohibiting such arrangements for her own protection. The Dark Lord's influence ran deep in the very bones of Wizarding society; Lily's daughter wouldn't have lived through infancy had she remained in the magical world.

Slytherin watched the girl, too. Selwyn nattered on in his ear about some petty grievance and Slytherin didn't even bother to nod; he ran the tip of his thumb against the tips of his fingers over and over again, then touched one of the ubiquitous books he seemed to always carry, the formation of dastardly thoughts churning like thunderheads amassing on a horizon, threatening an oncoming storm. Severus had watched one too many Slytherin students succumb to the man who wore the name of their House like a smiling mask; he wasn't about to watch Potter run headlong into the hurricane.

He shoved away his cold plate and stood.

"Finished, Severus?" Minerva asked, eying the wasted food.

"Yes." Severus paused "Potter has a detention to serve."

"A detention?!"

Severus didn't give an explanation. He gathered himself and strode from the dais, walking into the midst of the Great Hall instead of leaving through the side chamber. Potter didn't notice him until he snapped her name and the snake darted for cover under her robes once more. He felt stupid for not noticing the creature sooner; it looped itself about her shoulder and gave the scrawny girl an odd, moving hunch.

"P-Professor?"

"Come with me, Potter."

She did as told, scrambling up from the empty table, leaving behind a plate of food just as full as Severus' had been. She trailed after the Potions Master as he strode out of the hall and made for the dungeon corridor, his left eyes aching in the sudden—and severe—shift in temperature. He rubbed at the scars, irritated, and tried to think of what to do with the brat now. Minerva would verbally flay him later. His immediate plan had been to remove Potter from Slytherin's sight; like the symbol of his Noble House, the man had an indolent disposition, a propensity for snatching things dangled in front of his nose before hunting for bigger, juicier prey. Slytherin wouldn't put the effort into searching for Potter if she wasn't in his immediate vicinity.

Severus wondered if Albus would protest him giving the girl detention for the rest of break.

"Professor Snape? Am I…in trouble?" she asked, the words coming out small and nervous, like Severus might turn around and start screaming. He rolled his eyes—and immediately regretted the motion when his left began to throb again.

"No," he retorted as they entered the Potions classroom. He pointed at one of the tables near his desk, told the girl "Sit," and she did so. "The infirmary requires new potions to be brewed and I would rather not waste my time with menial prep work. Since you have nothing better to do…."

Defiance sparked in her, a brief flicker of irritation behind tired eyes, and Severus waited for her to take exception to his tone— but then Potter looked down and nodded without protest. Odd.

Severus flicked his wand toward the storage cupboard and waited for the needed ingredients to come zooming out, settling a cutting board, a knife, and a sizable clutch of different roots on the table before her. "These must be cut to specification. Watch carefully." He diced one daisy root and one stick of yew, then sliced a Gurdyroot, showing the girl how each needed to be prepared. "Do you think you can manage that, Miss Potter?"

"Yeah—yes, Professor."

"Good."

Severus retreated to his desk and retrieved the proper cauldrons needed to brew Pomfrey's potions. Silence descended over the dungeon, broken only by the small noises arising from their separate motions: the quiet scuff of Severus' shoes on the floor, the screech of metal cauldron legs sliding on wood, the slow but steady thud of the knife cutting through plant matter. Potter concentrated on her task, nose wrinkled against the smell of split Gurdyroot. Her potion making abilities weren't as clear as her Muggle-born friend's, but she had a spot of talent in handling ingredients and properly measuring materials—not like Black. Every cauldron Black touched seemed to collapse in on itself.

They worked without exchanging words for an hour—well, Severus worked without exchanging words while the girl hissed from the corner of her mouth and made a mockery of subtlety. He could hear the serpent whisper in return as they carried on a conversation. Every sibilant word hit his ear like a sledgehammer, images of the Dark Lord flashing through his recollection, memories of deadly vipers spilling through the man's white, white hands and stirring around their ankles, Death Eaters trembling in fear as pythons thicker round than grown wizards slithered through the room.

Severus sat down with a heavy sigh and rubbed at his sore eye as his iron cauldron continued to simmer. Why can't anything ever be simple?

"Professor Snape? Is your eye okay?"

He froze, then jerked his hand away from his face. Shit. "It's fine," he snapped, leveling a fierce glower in the nosy chit's direction, daring her to question it again. Not many students knew about his eye, not anymore. Those who'd been in school when the incident occurred had graduated, leaving their younger siblings and friends with nothing more than rumors and speculations—rumors and speculations that proved to Severus the uncreative idiocy of his students over and over again.

"Sorry, sir." She didn't sound sorry. She sounded irked, and Severus guessed he deserved that for dragging her to the bloody frozen dungeons and telling her to chop roots. What other excuse could he give? Stay away from your Defense professor, he's an ill-defined, maliciously clever, nefarious duplicate of the same Dark Lord who killed your parents? He regularly bends the minds of children to accept his potentially deadly ideology? Slytherin would read that in Potter's head like he was perusing the Daily Prophet and Severus would probably be dead in a week.

"Potter…." Severus paused, then stood to inspect his cauldron again. "Why did you choose to stay for the holidays?"

The knife's steady thud stuttered. "Err—what?"

"Are you deaf, girl?"

"No, it's just—why do you want to know? Sir?"

Severus quirked a brow as he stirred, counting the ladle's revolutions through the thick concoction. No, Potter had no subtlety whatsoever, but for a moment, he saw a glint of Slytherin evasiveness in the girl. Being eleven, it was unrefined, the childish misdirection of a girl used to lying to idiot Muggles, not practiced deceivers like Severus—but is was there, and likely part of the reason she ended up in the House of Serpents. "That doesn't answer my question."

"I'm not deaf." She poked at the daisy roots, shredding the messy ends, staining her fingertips green. "My, err, relatives work."

"Yes, everyone works, Potter. Does that work actually interfere with you returning to your home?"

She thought about it. Severus saw her trying to come up with some answer beyond 'my aunt's a bitch,' like little cogs clicking behind the face of a clock. "Yes."

"In what way?"

"I dunno. Just does." Potter furiously chopped at the roots again and created a mess of useless pulp. "I ruined these, I think. Sorry, professor."

Severus scoffed at her purposeful destruction, but allowed the subject to drop for now. "Never mind. Move on to the yew." She did so, and he removed the ladle from his cauldron, careful to not unduly disturb the base mixture. "And what of Black? Surely her caregivers could spare her for the holidays. Why did she not stay?"

The stiffness leached from the girl's shoulders and she stopped massacring the roots. "Oh, um—." Severus winced when she brought the knife too close to her face, using the hand to adjust her glasses. "Elara's uncle's been sick and she's a bit worried about him, so she decided it'd be best to go home."

Uncle? Severus took a moment to pore through his knowledge of Black's family lineage; her wretch of a father only had one brother, Regulus, and he'd been presumed dead since before Potter or Elara Black's birth. Marlene McKinnon had no brothers and only one older sister who died with the rest of the McKinnons in the fire. Black had no uncle—unless she meant great uncle. Severus knew through Narcissa's scathing comments that Cygnus was still alive and still not speaking to the Malfoy family after they quarreled years ago. Perhaps he was the one who took Black in.

Potter kept talking. "She's also hoping to find out more about her parents, since her uncle didn't really know them, I guess. He doesn't even know her mum's name and it's been hard getting information while at Hogwarts."

Severus stilled. "…does Black know who her father is?"

"Yeah—I mean, yes. But she doesn't really like to talk about him."

Ah, he thought. So she does know about him. The students are quick enough to call her the 'Madman's Daughter,' so I shouldn't be surprised. "Her mother was Marlene McKinnon."

The sound of the knife hitting the cutting board came to a stop yet again and Severus lifted his gaze from the cauldron. Potter stared at him in astonishment. He scowled.

"You will keep the source of that information to yourself, Potter!"

"Y-yes, sir!"

Severus glared and the girl returned to her task. She prodded a Gurdyroot with the tip of the knife and lunged forward to grab it before the spherical root could roll off the table. Potter's friendship with the Black heir still grated on Severus, so he found himself speaking before he could think better of it. "It doesn't surprise me Black dislikes speaking of her father. He was an abominable human being and a very dangerous wizard. Most Blacks are."

Potter glanced up and caught his eye. She'd heard the implicit hint in his tone. They stared at one another as Potter passed the Gurdyroot between her small hands and her thoughts churned inside her head. Severus wasn't fool enough to think she'd toss Black's friendship aside on his accusations, but he hoped the sentiment sank in somewhere in thick skull. Even he hadn't suspected Sirius Black of being a traitor; he wouldn't see Potter's spawn fall into the same trap.

"It doesn't really matter though, does it, sir?" she said slowly. "I mean, whoever her dad is or was, it doesn't matter. Most kids don't grow up to be like their parents. Not really, anyway."

Severus looked at Potter for several seconds, expression inscrutable, then spoke. "No," he said. The cauldron hissed and bubbled, and the flame cast an eerie light through the cold room. "They don't."


	26. reflections of desire

**_xxvi. reflections of desire_**

Harriet peeked into the deserted corridor, let the tapestry fall behind her, and released a relieved breath.

Professor Snape hated her. It was the only reason she could imagine responsible for his sudden, burning need to give Harriet detention every time they crossed paths; four days had passed since the rest of the student body went home and already Harriet had been given _four_ detentions. One she spent chopping more potion ingredients, one cleaning cauldrons, one polishing trophies with Filch, and one lingering in the Transfiguration classroom. Professor McGonagall didn't seem all that pleased with Professor Snape and probably would have let Harriet go had Harriet not been convinced she'd only get another detention for leaving detention early.

He punished her for the stupidest things—for having messy hair or for dropping a book or for _sneezing too loud_. When Harriet protested, Snape gave her yet another detention, all while wearing a smug expression that dared Harriet to argue further so he could extend what rubbish penance he'd already assigned. Naturally, she wouldn't accuse a git like Snape of ever _liking_ anyone, but Harriet'd thought he didn't hate her as much as he seemed to hate the Gryffindors—or Elara, who melted all his cauldrons and once caught her table on fire. She'd obviously been mistaken.

The corridor was Snape-free—or it _looked_ Snape-free, at least. Harriet felt cautiously optimistic. She walked carefully as she headed for the library, which she hoped was close enough to Professor McGonagall's office to stave off anymore run-ins with the Potions Master. She tried coaxing Set into being her lookout, but her shadow remained obstinate and quiet, much to Harriet's frustration. She would've kicked him had she known where his shins were and if it wouldn't have bruised her toes on the stone floor.

One stairwell separated Harriet from her destination. She wanted to run, if only to get there quicker and find a quiet table out of sight where she could think about reading the books Hermione always pestered her about and probably settle on something more recreational. Harriet wished one of her friends could've stayed, but she understood better than most the importance of a loving family, and she wouldn't begrudge Elara or Hermione for wanting to go home and see theirs.

Maybe she could reach the Owlery. Elara had left her bird behind so Harriet could write if she wanted. Harriet would've used a school owl, but Elara said a school owl probably couldn't reach her because of the old enchantments covering her house. The owl still didn't have a name and Harriet kept trying to give him one whenever he stopped by in the morning for part of Elara's breakfast, yet the owl disliked every choice she gave him, leaving Harriet with nothing but nipped fingers for her efforts.

Raised voices in the stairwell reached Harriet's ears and she froze.

"—don't know how you're managing it, but I'll go straight to Flitwick, I swear—," one Ravenclaw snarled at another, his bespectacled face mottled with flushed red color.

"I'm not cheating, you're just a bloody moron." The taller Ravenclaw shoved the boy in glasses and took a step back. "You've never been top of the class so I don't get what your problem is—."

"I was top of the year last term—!"

"Yeah, that was _sixth_ year," the Ravenclaw sneered. "No one cares about _sixth_ year, dunce." He turned and climbed the steps toward Harriet, slamming his feet down as he went. The sound of his stride echoed in the enclosed space. "Get out of the way, Slytherin."

Harriet shuffled to the side, though the larger Ravenclaw still knocked his arm against hers. On the landing below, the bespectacled boy glowered at the taller student, his eyes hard—until suddenly he had his wand clenched in his fist and his voice rang in the stairwell when he shouted, " _Slugulus Eructo!_ "

Really, Harriet had no desire to be in the middle of whatever issues the two older students were arguing about. She much rather be in the library, reading a nice story book, or in the Owlery sending a letter, or outside in the snow building snowmen and generally avoiding any of the school's professors, especially Snape. However, long hours in the Defense classroom or studying practical lessons with Hermione had drilled habit into Harriet's head; when the curse came flying toward the other Ravenclaw, Harriet had her wand in hand, incanting, " _Protego_!"

The spell struck her transparent shield and ricocheted into the wall, where it left a long smear of a green, slimy substance. It looked like bogeys to Harriet's eyes. "Oh, _ew_ , gross—!"

The taller Ravenclaw whipped around on his heels and jabbed his own wand toward his fellow. " _Calvario!_ "

Red light smacked the bespectacled boy in the face—and suddenly the brown curls atop his head fell from his scalp like dead leaves off a tree. His eyebrows did the same. The taller student barked with laughter, and the furious boy below took the chance to yell, " _Locomotor Mortis!_ "

The second boy's legs snapped together and Harriet yelped when he toppled into her, almost sending them both down the steps. She grabbed the Ravenclaw by the arm in an attempt to keep him upright, but he was a great deal larger and heavier than Harriet, his weight dragging her down with him as he fell and smacked his face on the top step. The bespectacled—and bald, very bald—Ravenclaw started to climb, his wand raised, and because Harriet had crumpled atop the other boy, she knew any spell sent his way would hit her instead, so she grappled to right her grip on her own wand, eyes wide, mouth dry—.

"Enough!"

The sudden voice froze the three students in place and dread spilled along Harriet's spine like ice water. Professor Slytherin appeared at the bottom of the stairs, books tucked under an arm, his red eyes roving from the pile of hair strewn on the stones to the Ravenclaws and finally to Harriet herself, who shrank under his scrutiny and adjusted her glasses. "Are you injured, Miss Potter?"

"N-no, Professor Slytherin."

"Good." He flicked his wand and the mess on the floor burst into flames, the hair incinerating itself to nothing in a matter of seconds as Slytherin strode up the steps. "Forty points from Ravenclaw," he snarled. "Get up, Henge."

The boy on the floor—Henge—tried, but his legs were immobile from the waist down still so he could only manage an ungainly push-up. A small pool of blood had formed where he'd smashed his nose.

"Pathetic, the pair of you. _Finite Incantatem_." The cursed ended and Henge righted himself, wincing at the bruise forming on his face. He fired a furious look in the other boy's direction, then wilted when he caught Professor Slytherin's eye. "Henge, Sanders—you will both go to the Hospital Wing and wait there for the Headmaster and your Head of House. If I catch wind of even so much as a _whisper_ of more fighting…." Slytherin allowed his hissed threat to trail off into nothing and the two boys ran for it, their quarrel forgotten in lieu of escaping Slytherin's wrath. Harriet tried to sidestep by him and make her own escape. His hand came down on her shoulder and squeezed.

"A moment of your time, Miss Potter," he said with a smile—one of those smiles that wasn't a smile at all, simply a tight curl of his lips like a snake preparing to open its jaws and devour a cricket whole. "I'm sure the Headmaster will appreciate an unbiased report of this embarrassing behavior."

He then proceeded to march her straight back the way she'd come, up to the top floor of the high tower, where Harriet had hid herself early in the day to escape Snape-the-dungeon-dweller. Slytherin brought them to a halt before a winged gargoyle crouching low with bared teeth, and the man said the words, "Pumpkin Pasty."

Harriet glanced at him, wondering if the wizard had gone mad, and the gargoyle shifted aside, revealing a set of spiral steps that began to revolve upward the moment Slytherin pushed them past the entrance. At the top of the stairs waited a door carved with intricate designs bearing an aged patina, though Harriet didn't have time to appreciate the picture because Slytherin shoved the door open without knocking. He ushered Harriet into the space beyond.

Harriet hadn't been called into the Headmaster's office before; she liked to believe she was rather well-behaved, punching-Ron-in-the-mouth incidents aside. The Headmistress in primary had punished her on occasion, so Harriet expected Dumbledore's office to be something like hers; wood finishes, a large desk, lots and lots of little folders for organizing. She _did_ see a large desk ahead of her—but everything else in Professor Dumbledore's office was nothing like Harriet would have guessed. Shelves lining the lower walls were crowded with all manner of texts and above waited line after line of gilded portraits, most of the residents fast asleep, or at least pretending to sleep. Low tables held collections of odd, whirring instruments cast in silver, emitting thin puffs of steam or chiming with gentle song. By the desk stood a golden perch, and on the perch rested the most regal bird Harriet had ever seen.

She glanced about but found no sign of Professor Dumbledore.

Professor Slytherin sighed, rolling his eyes at the crimson bird as it warbled a bright melody that eased the tension in Harriet's shoulders and warmed her heart. "It appears we will have to wait for Dumbledore's return," he said as he settled in one of the armchairs facing the desk. "Wonderful."

He gestured toward the accompanying chair and Harriet eased into it, nibbling on her lower lip, watching the man from the corner of her eye. The bird chose that moment to hop off its perch and come rest upon Harriet's knees, leveling her a searching look as it cocked its head to the side and clacked its beak. Nervous, Harriet lifted a hand to stroke the bird's striking plumage and it allowed her to do so, crooning once, twice, and then taking flight again, alighting through an open window into the gentle flutter of snow beyond. Harriet watched it leave and, for some reason, felt incorrigibly sad.

Whispering jerked her head around just as Professor Slytherin tucked one of his books into the front of his robes. Harriet caught only a glimpse of it; bound in black leather with brass tabs on the corners, it appeared to be a journal, and the second it slipped out of sight, the whispering stopped. Professor Slytherin met Harriet's inquisitive gaze and smiled. Again, the expression showed nothing but sharp teeth and something distinctly vicious that made Harriet swallow and look away.

"Something the matter, Miss Potter?"

"N-no, professor."

"Hmm."

The wizard studied Harriet, his thoughts unknowable, his index finger tapping his lower lip until Slytherin put aside his woolgathering and summoned a book off one of Dumbledore's shelves with a wandless wave of his hand. The cabinet door sprung open and the book made an audible slap of sound when it landed in Slytherin's upheld palm. Stare still lingering on Harriet, he popped the book open, then began to read.

If Harriet thought conversations with the Defense professor were nerve-racking, his silence was even more so. She kept shooting furtive looks toward his chest without meaning to, thinking about that journal with its weird whispering and the strange, gelatinous feeling of dread she'd gotten from just seeing it. Like tar, the feeling stuck with her despite the book's absence and left behind a smudged residue, something tacky beneath her fingers that Harriet couldn't help but poke and prod and scratch at.

She stood and meandered toward the Headmaster's tables of silver instruments, putting much needed space between her and Slytherin while also sating her curiosity. Harriet didn't know anything of what those contraptions did and could only guess and wonder to their function. She bit back the urge to touch things, a voice suspiciously like Aunt Petunia's snapping at her to keep her grubby hands to herself, though Harriet still craned her neck, twisting this way and that, to get a better look. She swore she heard one of the portraits snort, but they all resumed their naps when she glanced up in suspicion.

The was a room adjoined to the main office. Of course, there were several other rooms and a set of stairs Harriet suspected led to Professor Dumbledore's private quarters, but the door to this room stood partly open—or partly closed, the chamber beyond roughly the size of a large cupboard or a small study, illuminated by a single golden candle. Harriet poked her head inside for a look and saw nothing but a couple of closed trunks, a few shelves holding some broken oddments—and a mirror.

The door's hinges creaked as Harriet stepped inside. She stared at the gilded mirror that reached from floor to ceiling, spots of wear speckled on the silver glass, words carefully chiseled into the thick gold frame arching over the mirror's top: _Erised stra ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on wohsi_. Harriet wrinkled her nose and decided if that wasn't a bunch of gibberish, she didn't know what was.

 _Maybe it's some kind of spell_ , she thought as she edged nearer and peeked at her reflection. _Maybe something to activate it—_.

There were people standing right behind her.

" _Frick_ —!" Harriet jumped and wheeled about, heart pounding. No one was there.

She glanced at the mirror and found that the image hadn't changed.

 _Is this room haunted or something? Does Dumbledore have a closet full of ruddy ghosts? Or is this some kind of joke mirror—?_

A woman stood closest to her, and she passed her fingers through mirror-Harriet's hair, through real-Harriet couldn't feel it. She looked into the woman's eyes—and they were familiar, so familiar, and the man at her side grinned from ear to ear, black hair untidy, glasses sliding down his skinny nose, and behind them lingered _more_ faces, all of them so achingly memorable—.

Harriet blinked. A hollow ringing built in her ears and beneath her feet Set curled, shadows clinging to her heels, slowing her laborious trudge toward the mirror as Harriet lifted a hand and felt the cold glass beneath her fingertips. "…Mum?"

The woman nodded.

As if she'd taken a punch to the gut, the air whooshed from Harriet's lungs and she gaped, wordless, hands trembling. The image blurred and shifted, the crowd in the background dissolving so two additional figures could appear with Harriet and her parents. A younger girl with hazel eyes gripped the wizard's hand and the witch had a third girl, a toddler with dark red hair, balanced on her hip. _Siblings_ , Harriet's beleaguered brain supplied, and the thought plinked through her like a breeze in wind chimes, hollow bones resounding with a soundless, vibrating _need_ she had never encountered before.

Harriet didn't know what her parents looked like. Here and there she'd heard a comment about her hair being like James' or her eyes like Lily's, but Harriet had never seen this for herself and now she could. She wanted desperately to know the name of her siblings, to know if they liked Harriet, if they spent time together as a family, if her mum baked cookies and how warm her dad's hugs were. What was growing up in a wizarding household like? She pressed her hand flat to the glass in effort to slip through it and join those on the other side.

"Ah, the Mirror of Erised. What a droll trinket."

Harriet jerked back. Professor Slytherin sauntered through the open door with his arms crossed and he smirked at her, and the mirror. Not wanting him to see her family, Harriet stepped to the side, out of frame, and her parents vanished.

"Figured out how it works then, Potter?"

She hadn't, no. Why did the mirror show her family? Her mum and dad had been real enough—but those two girls hadn't _ever_ existed. Did it show some type of alternate future? A world that would never be? Harriet's heart ached in her chest and she laid a hand against it, fingers brushing the edge of her lopsided tie as she recalled the sudden burst of emotion that had erupted there, the sheer _need_ —.

"It—it shows you what you want," she stuttered. "Whatever you want, even if it's not possible."

"Partially. Five points to Slytherin." The professor shrugged as he leaned his weight against one of the shelves. The shelf didn't appear very sturdy, and yet it didn't wobble in the slightest. "The Mirror of Erised is enchanted to show your most ardent desire, not the petty wants of everyday life. Many a wizard and witch have been fool enough to let the images depicted therein drive them to madness."

"So it's not real," she whispered, more to herself than to Slytherin, her eye still drawn to the mirror despite the absence of her family. She wanted to see them, just once more, just long enough to commit the image to memory, just so she could have the picture of them in her head—.

Harriet hated the mirror when she realized Slytherin was right, that someone could go quite mad wanting to look at that lying hunk of antique junk, even if just for a few seconds more. Her weight leaned precariously forward and Harriet had to smother the voice in the back of her head telling her to take that step, to bring herself into the mirror's line of sight, to _look_ one more time. _It's not true. It's pretend, like dreams in my head projected onto the surface. It's not real_.

"What do you see, Miss Potter?" Slytherin asked. Her breaths still came in shallow increments when she turned to him, then lowered her chin, not wanting to meet his terrifying eyes.

"Err—I'm with my relatives. It's Christmas time," she lied, deciding it best to splice in a measure of truth.

Slytherin tipped his head and a curl of brown hair fell across his brow. " _Yule_ ," the wizard corrected her in a sharp voice. "Christmas is a Muggle holiday. Yule is celebrated by magical kind. Why, Miss Potter, it sounds as if you were _raised_ by Muggles."

Then he grinned and Harriet wanted to sink through the floor and disappear. Her neck itched something fierce.

Movement at the door caught her attention. Dumbledore stood there in crimson robes striped with thin lines of gold, his sleeves lined with fur that looked particularly warm. "Hello, Harriet," he greeted with a gentle smile—then his blue eyes cut to Professor Slytherin and the soft creases on his brow became hard and deep. "Is there a reason you've brought Miss Potter here, Tom?"

Slytherin sucked air through his teeth and Harriet thought of how Uncle Vernon would've cuffed him in the back of the head for showing that kind of disrespect. "Miss Potter witnessed a fight between Henge and Sanders. I thought it best she give her account of the story, lest you question my _bias_."

"Oh, I'd never doubt your professionalism, Tom. Simply your methods." Something cold slithered in Dumbledore's normally jovial voice and Harriet shifted. The Headmaster extend his arm out toward her. "Come along, Harriet. It's best to leave the mirror alone and not dwell upon what is seen within. Dreams, while lovely, should not be pursued at the expense of living."

She placed her hand in the Headmaster's and, when his warm fingers closed over hers, a feeling of safety enfolded Harriet like a new cloak. That prickly misery that had reared its ugly head after encountering the cursed mirror deflated, and though Harriet could see Slytherin sneer in disapproval, Harriet smiled at Professor Dumbledore and followed after him.


	27. the house of black

_**xxvii. the house of black**_

Elara yanked on her trunk to get it over the crack in the sidewalk and scowled.

It was a long walk to Grimmauld Place from King's Cross, made all the more difficult by the thin layer of half-frozen snow that stuck to Elara's shoes and the trunk's wheels. She could have gotten a taxi, of course, but Elara hadn't thought of that before and didn't have any Muggle money on her person. Besides, she wanted to avoid the Muggle world, just in case the orphanage had reported her as a missing person.

 _Father Phillips would probably tell the cops I'm an escaped nutter._

Elara crossed the quiet square with the looming faces of townhouses watching her progress. Number Twelve Grimmauld Place appeared right between Number Eleven and Number Thirteen, rather woebegone and weathered compared to its neighbors, the whispered, tinny sound of a television fluttering out someone's cracked window. The neighbors flitted by their windows, ignorant to Elara's presence, and the many shuttered eyes of Number Twelve remained dark, haunting. She mounted the steps, huffing all the way, and ignored the serpent-shaped knob in favor of rapping on the door itself.

"Kreacher," she said aloud with a glance up and down the street, seeing no one. "Kreacher, open the door. Please." When nothing happened, Elara smacked the door with more strength. " _Kreacher_."

The knob creaked, twisted, and the door popped open an inch or so, allowing a sudden gasp of moldy air to escape, like breaching the vault of a forgotten tomb. Elara wrinkled her nose and quickly stepped inside. The house-elf's milky eyes gleamed in the low, sputtering light of the gas lamps once the door came closed again.

"The blood-traitor's daughter is back."

"Yes," she said, sighing. Kreacher had warmed to her—somewhat—over the summer hols, but it seemed he was back to referring to her as the _blood-traitor's brat_. "It's nice to see you too, Kreacher."

The elf grumbled and sneered but otherwise refrained from making a comment. "Master Cygnus is not well."

The handle of Elara's trunk slipped from her sweaty hand and thumped on the dusty carpet. A knot had begun to twist itself into her middle not long after leaving Grimmauld for Hogwarts and it doubled itself now, tightening until Elara felt like she might be ill. "Can I—can I see him?"

"Kreacher will ask."

"Thank you."

He frowned and turned away, his pale body hunched and off-kilter as he tottered down the hall and up the stairs. Elara picked up her luggage again and went to find her room. She ignored the glassy-eyed stare of dead house-elves on the wall, a spider hanging from one's bulbous nose. Elara would have to do something about those heads, something that wouldn't set Kreacher off into a full-blown fit and yet still removed them from her sight.

The room Elara had inhabited since that summer was, ironically, bedecked in faded banners of crimson and gold, a Gryffindor lion embossed on the wall—right between a few posters with scantily dressed models that pouted when Elara pinned sheets of parchment over them. She would tear them down if they hadn't been stuck to the wallpaper with a spell.

It was in this room that she had found the journal, the one she took to reading between assignments at school or on the long train ride into the city. The writer had been particularly fond of code names and she had no idea who used to inhabit the space she now utilized. Cygnus himself had only come to live at Grimmauld some years after Walburga's passing, when his illness had worsened beyond its initial stages, and thus didn't know much of the house's more detailed information. Kreacher could tell her, were he not the most intractable of people Elara had ever had the misfortune of meeting.

She settled down and took out the journal in question, a tattered thing with a magical shop's logo branded into the inside cover along with a series of nonsensical doodles. It was not a diary—not the sort Elara had ever seen—but rather a book of thoughts, funny anecdotes, ideas, and bits of copied lectures. What she found particularly compelling were the parts detailing Animagi and their transformations. Whoever had owned the journal had a penchant for rude humor and was an absolutely brilliant wizard.

Elara thumbed the weathered pages, considering the scribbled handwriting and the careless blotches of ink. She'd considered the possibility of the book belonging to her father—he'd lived in this house too, as far as she knew—but Elara couldn't reconcile the image in her head, and dozens of Black sons had lived in the house over the years. "Padfoot" wrote with vivacity, wrote about pranks and a boy he fancied named "Mooney" and how much he loved Quidditch; Sirius Black was a madman who killed thirteen people with one curse and supposedly _laughed_. The journal _couldn't_ belong to him.

Feeling sick at heart, Elara set the journal aside and exhaled. She rubbed at her wrists and wished the cold didn't make them ache so.

Kreacher arrived with a sudden _pop!_ and she jumped, startled, giving the house-elf a reproving look as he grinned nastily. "Master Cygnus is awake."

"Thank you, Kreacher."

The elf disappeared as Elara stood, straightened her clothes, and headed up to the proper bedroom. She knocked on the door and the occupant called out entry, voice as weak as a summer breeze, and Elara eased into the room. The dark remained omniscient with shadows as thick as shrouds, the smell of sick and ash heavy as a morning fog. Elara strode forward without waiting for invitation and brushed her fingers against the base of the candlestick sitting on the nightstand. A grunt rose from the bed when the candle came to life.

"Brat," Cygnus rasped as he turned his head on the pillow and his black hair clung in limp coils to his pale skin. Elara pulled the shade low around the candle to dilute the light and her great uncle sighed in response. "Thank you."

"How are you, Uncle?"

Cygnus didn't respond. His eyes gleamed in the flickering light, two bright spots in and otherwise blurred countenance. Elara felt the sudden urge to tear away the shade and cast the light fully upon him, just so she could _see_ him, so she could see how much worse he must have gotten in her absence, but she'd been raised with better respect, even if she resented _that_ place with every bone in her body. Cygnus wouldn't tell her and it was better if she didn't ask. "How was your trip?"

"Fine. Uneventful."

He harrumphed. "How is Slytherin House treating you?"

"Fine." Elara fidgeted, bringing her fingers together, studying her nails. "I have some friends and my studies have been going well."

"Ah, yes. The Potter girl and the Mud—Muggle-born." He narrowed his eyes. "I do hope you haven't alienated the students from the old families?"

"No, but they are a bit…." Elara trailed off and Cygnus chuckled. The sound was heavy, wet, and painful.

"They will grow out of their idiocy with age," he said. "They confuse bigotry with House pride and forget a man's fortunes can dwindle in a single afternoon." Cygnus coughed and turned from Elara, facing the dark. "The blue potion, if you'd be so kind…."

Elara jumped up to retrieve the asked for mixture, then returned to her seat. At Cygnus' prompting, she continued to share stories of her time attending Hogwarts and he coached her to speak up or to speak more, because telling a good tale was part of knowing how present oneself. He scoffed over recollections of Draco's behavior and stated that "Allowing Narcissa to marry Lucius Malfoy" had been one of his stupider decisions in life. "He may be pure of blood, but he and his father Abraxas are the greatest of cross-eyed dolts."

She pressed her lips into a firm line to swallow her laugh and if Cygnus noticed, he chose not to comment.

"To that end, I actually have a gift for you…." Elara's great uncle shifted and she heard the fine scratch of paper moving on paper before he found the missive he wanted and extended it to her, bringing his trembling hand into the light. Elara stared at the pale, wasted thing and felt something twist in her middle again. His skin was paler than the parchment and just as thin and dry. "The letter, brat."

"My apologies." Elara took it from him. She opened the page and held it closer to the single candle, squinting against the dark to decipher the words scrawled there in a very official manner. It was some kind of legal document and the jargon therein confused Elara, since her vocabulary leaned more toward the romantic, poetic styling of religious dogma. "This says I've been—."

"Emancipated," Cygnus said with a sigh, as if he'd grown tired of watching Elara try to read. "It took a great deal of gold and _persuasion_ to manage it for a girl your age. What it means is that upon my death you will become the proxy-Head of our family, and you will not be forced into some lesser household—or, Merlin forbid, taken in by one of my daughters. You will be recognized as an adult in the eyes of magical law."

Elara stared at the paper in her grip until her eyes blurred. "I don't have to go back to the orphanage." She had no plans of ever returning there, but it had always been a possibility, a threat looming in the back of her mind like the ominous rattle of handcuffs and the slow intonation of priestly chanting. She didn't have to fear ending up somewhere just as despicable in the Wizarding world.

"No, you don't."

Careful, as if handling a priceless heirloom, Elara folded the letter and held it to her chest, repressing the prickling sensation in her eyes that threatened tears. Cygnus wouldn't appreciate that. "Thank you."

He didn't smile, but he did watch Elara, his gaze glassy with pain and his sunken skin wet with fresh perspiration. "You will do the House of Black proud," he said. His words rang with certainty, the kind of certainty only men like her great uncle—men who'd walked in the upper echelon of society and had sampled the fruits of indulgence—could achieve. "The least I could do was assure you were not taken away from it."

 **x**

Cygnus Black died three days after Elara arrived at Grimmauld Place.

She woke early in the morning to the sound of house-elf sobs echoing in the narrow corridors and entered her great uncle's bedroom to find that he had, presumably, expired in his sleep sometime the night prior. At a loss, she sank into the armchair by the bedside and stared as Kreacher howled and Elara patted the elf's heaving shoulders. Cygnus' death was sudden, though not unexpected. Had he not introduced himself to her by stating his condition was fatal? Elara knew that, had seen how shaky his handwriting had grown, how tired he sounded, and yet she'd hoped for more time. Just a little more time.

Having been a man of thought and foresight in life, Elara's great uncle had made arrangements for his inevitable end and had left detailed instructions for Elara—or Kreacher, had she not been home when he passed on. Elara liked to think herself passably clever and well-read, but she was still only eleven, and she had never dealt with a death in the family before. She appreciated the tidy, bulleted instruction scrolls as she'd appreciated everything given and taught to her by Cygnus in the short time of their acquaintance.

Letters were written and sent out to Cygnus' specifications, Elara managing to coax her great uncle's ancient owl—Percival—out into the frigid weather. St. Mungo's was contacted, a death certificate issued, and the mortuary received a new occupant. Elara spent much of that first afternoon sitting small and uncertain in the overlarge leather chair of Cygnus' solicitor, Mr Piers, who became Elara's solicitor and managed the arrangements and the obituary for the Daily Prophet. Elara returned to Grimmauld Place and spent time in the library, trying to muddle through the legal diction with a dictionary. She wished Hermione was there to help. She wished Harriet was there to make her laugh.

Two days later, Elara found herself walking up a flight of iced steps as the air escaped her lungs in puffs of white and she struggled to hold onto both her umbrella and the handrail. Around her rose the dark, snow covered tombs and markers belonging to wizards and witches long dead, the sky cloudy but bright with the sun hidden in the silver whorls, the silence broken only by Elara's slow tread.

The cemetery in the borough of Hertsmere had belonged to the magical folk of Britain for generations, before Merlin was born or Hogwarts was built, before Hadrian's Wall rose—before the Romans even thought about crossing the water. Most of the old Wizarding families aside from the Lestranges had mausoleums or plots there, and the Blacks were no exception. Cygnus had chosen one of the spots that lay in the shadow of the Black tomb itself, by his wife Druella and his brother Alphard, and the gravedigger had already prepared the site by removing the ice and spelling a barrier over the plot that stop more snow from falling. Elara paused when she came in view of her destination.

A priest stood at the head of the waiting grave, a bible in his hands, his pointed hat stuck to his stooped head with a spell. The church and magical kind had a long and often vicious history together. The Catholic miracle workers had more often than not been wizards who—in ages past—would use their abilities to heal the sick or inspire the wayward, and the clergy had been known to harbor witches attempting to escape persecution. Elara knew Hogwarts had a small chapel not far from the dungeons, a place where the Fat Friar lingered—not that she'd ever been there.

Elara swallowed and kept walking.

Aside from the priest and the gravedigger, four other people stood on the patch of grass cleared of snow, waiting for the service to commence. A blond wizard bent to mutter into the ear of his wife, both dressed in black robes tooled in silver, the latter wearing a gilded cameo at her throat that bore the Black crest. The two witches who stood on the opposing side of the grave were less polished than the first pair, the older witch obviously a Black, with her patrician beauty and practiced posture, her hair lighter than Elara's and her expression soft. A witch several years older than Elara waited with the woman, streaks of vermilion coloring her brown hair.

Closing her umbrella, Elara stepped past the ward and found several pairs of eyes swiveling in her direction.

"Ah, Miss Black," the priest said with a kindly smile, though Elara couldn't quite meet his gaze. "Are we ready to begin, then?"

"Yes, sorry," she replied. She would have told them it was a long walk from the road and even longer walk from the train station but refrained, a lump growing in her throat.

A magical funeral service proved similar to its mundane counterpart. Elara had never attended a funeral before, of course, but she'd seen them happening in the cemetery that adjoined the church's lot next to the orphanage and had listened to the voices on the wind, ashes to ashes, tearful widows, people shaking their heads and whispering "such a shame." Cygnus' funeral was quieter than that, no one aside from the priest speaking, the snow still falling silent below the mausoleum's eaves, the gravedigger smoking at a respectful distance, waiting.

Elara wrung her hands until creases appeared in her leather gloves.

The priest stopped speaking and drew his wand. He enacted several spells without uttering a word, a soft yellow light phasing over the coffin before the gravedigger left his post and lowered Cygnus into the earth. The waiting witches and wizard conjured flowers to toss down, which Elara couldn't do, being underaged and scarcely trained, so the young witch with red in her hair passed a carnation to her with a smile. Elara flushed before adding her flower to the others. Magic returned the dirt to its proper place, resowed the sod, and Transfigured a blank sheet of marble into a stately headstone embossed with the family's motif and Cygnus' name. The ward fell with a soft _pop!_ of displaced air. Snow speckled the grass.

It was over. Cygnus was gone.

"Miss Black."

The blond wizard spoke as he and his wife turned from the fresh grave without a glance in its direction. Looking at him, with his haughty sneer and cold eyes, Elara was struck with a sudden rush of _déjà vu_ , though she couldn't quite place where she'd seen the man before.

"My name is Lucius, of the Most Noble House of Malfoy, and this is my wife, Narcissa, Cygnus' youngest daughter."

Elara's eye twitched at the excessively formal greeting—though she realized where she'd seen him now; Draco was a foul little carbon copy of the wizard before her. Hermione never said a word against the Malfoys, but life in St. Giles had drilled the importance of subtext into Elara's head; Hermione said nothing against the Malfoys and nothing _for_ them, her eyes always blank whenever Draco opened his trap to wax poetic about his vaunted father. Cygnus claimed the Malfoys were weak-willed, wealthy and impeccably bred but unable to do anything more than ride the coattails of others. Really, Elara hadn't met anyone who had something _nice_ to say about the couple now looking down their noses at her.

"Hello," she responded, fidgeting with her sleeves. When Elara declined to say more, Lucius cleared his throat. She doubted they knew her name.

"Yes, well. I have been led to believe you resided with Cygnus at—." He hesitated, like he had the name on the tip of his tongue and couldn't quite spit it out. "At—?"

"Grimmauld Place," the wife—Narcissa—put in. "Aunt Walburga's, Lucius. Uncle Orion cursed the place so thoroughly the name escapes those who aren't current residents or Blacks."

"Of course," he drawled. "How remiss of me. Nevertheless, with Cygnus passed and your father's continued incarceration, we will be able to make arrangements and take you into our home—."

"She doesn't have to go with _you._ " The witch with brown hair and kind eyes wasn't looking particularly kind as she left the grave's side; her stare hardened as she studied Lucius and found him wanting. She addressed Elara next. "Hello. I'm Andromeda Tonks, Cygnus' daughter, and this is _my_ daughter, Nymphadora—."

The younger witch flinched and the red in her hair suddenly turned a poisonous green. Elara blinked, shocked and more than a bit alarmed.

"She's a Metamorphmagus," Andromeda said by way of apology. "Dora, you know better than to—."

"Well, don't call me _Nymphadora_ in front of people—."

Lucius released a low, genteel scoff and raised his chin as Narcissa looked anywhere but directly at her sister. "You _clearly_ have your hands full, Andromeda. It would be best if we—."

"I'm not leaving Grimmauld," Elara said, freezing the others in place. Malfoy's brow furrowed.

"You don't expect your new guardian to _move in_ , do you?"

"I don't require a guardian."

"Don't be ridiculous."

"I have no intention of being ridiculous, Mr Malfoy. I don't need a guardian because I've been eman—." Elara had to form her tongue around the unfamiliar word and felt heat rise in her cheeks, feeling young and naive and about two centimeters tall in Mr Malfoy's eyes. " _Emancipated_."

"The Ministry does not _emancipate_ eleven year old pure-blood girls!"

Elara already had a hand in her robes, retrieving the folded copies of the legal notice Cygnus had left for her. She all but threw the first at Lucius and, for good measure, handed another to Andromeda, who accepted the note with something like sadness in her careworn expression. Lucius, meanwhile, was looking more and more thunderous with every line he read. Finally he snatched the letter from his own face and shoved it toward Narcissa's.

"This is the kind of unbecoming behavior we've come to expect from Cygnus. He was old and half mad with fever toward the end—."

"I think I would know better, Mr Malfoy, seeing as I was there," Elara replied. Her voice reflected more bravery than she actually felt, considering Lucius Malfoy had been— _was_ —a Death Eater, and Cygnus had no reservations about telling her those who pledged themselves to any wizard in such a manner were unpredictable and most certainly dangerous. She knew her great uncle had been more than a bit racist, but Cygnus had recognized his own failings and had made an effort to teach Elara what it meant to be a pure-blood without falling victim to one's own pride like the Malfoys.

Her gaze flicked toward the silent grave and a fresh stab of misery jolted her heart, Elara's eyes dampening of their own accord. She spent ten years in the orphanage and these people never spared a thought for her, having thought she was dead from infancy—and _now_ they cared. _Now_ they wanted a say in where she lived and whom got control over her life, but Elara wasn't having any of it.

"If you don't mind," she said, breath hitching. "I'm going to go home now."

"Listen here, girl, we don't accept this kind of insolence—."

"Narcissa, tell your wretched husband to let the poor girl be—."

New waves of civilized and grossly well-mannered invectives came hissing from Lucius' mouth while Elara took the opportunity to turn and walk away. She could feel the gaze of the witch who didn't like to be called Nymphadora lingering on her back.

The snow crunched under Elara's boots. The priest and the gravedigger had Disapparated the moment they sensed a family feud on the rise. Elara had left Grimmauld the Muggle way that morning after discovering Kreacher still weepy and inconsolable, balling into a pair of trousers for some inexplicable reason, but when Lucius snapped "Get _back_ here! You haven't been dismissed!", Elara shouted "Kreacher!" and the house-elf appeared. She stuck out her hand and, without another word, the glowering imp took hold of her and Apparated them home.

 **x**

It was much later, after night had fallen and silence had settled good and thick about Grimmauld Place, that Elara cried.

She sat at the table in the kitchen, folded as small as she could be in one of the stiff chairs with her arms wrapped about her legs and her nose buried in the crook of her knees. Tears painted damp patches on the hem of her skirt and Elara sniffled. Elara hadn't known Cygnus very long, and yet he'd shown her great patience, had given her all the tools she needed to succeed, and Elara appreciated that more than any pity she'd ever gotten, any half glances from the nicer sisters who said "Poor dear" and tried to ply her with extra desserts while never _doing_ anything. After all, they knew what would happen, had agreed with Father Phillips, had turned a blind eye when they dragged her from her bed in the dead of night and—.

A part of Elara wanted to yell, throw a tantrum or be overtly hysterical like Kreacher had been that morning. The sisters had taught her tears were a sign of weakness, and weakness was a sin—much like everything else, if she were being honest. So Elara sucked in a ragged breath and let out a sharp, short scream, just because she could. The sound echoed and one of the portraits out in the hall squawked. The tension in her chest ebbed, and Elara laughed, tired and lonely and yet inordinately pleased with herself for shattering the silence, if only for a second.

Somewhere farther in the house a clatter came and Elara paused, listening, hearing the approaching mutter and thump of familiar feet. The kitchen door swung open seemingly of its own accord—then Kreacher came into view, foul tempered as ever, carrying her owl in his arms. The owl, for his part, looked most displeased with this arrangement and shot filthy, accusing glares in the elf's direction.

"The _Mistress_ has mail."

"Thank you, Kreacher," Elara returned. The elf sniffed and let the owl go. The bird landed on the table with a screech, beating his wings, and Elara reached out to soothe his rumpled feathers. Harriet's voice played in the back of her mind, the bespectacled girl trying to give the scowling avian a name—monikers like ' _Zeus_ ' and ' _Bacon_ ' and ' _Berk_ ' after he smacked Harriet in the face—because " _All familiars need names, Elara!_ "

Bits of broken snowflakes melted until Elara's fingertips as she stroked his feathers and the owl stuck out his leg. Attached to it with a clumsy bit of twine was a letter from the aforementioned girl and Elara smiled when she took the letter in hand. _She remembered to write_.

The owl fluffed his plumage. Elara studied him and, unbidden, a name fell from her lips. "Cygnus."

He nipped her cool fingers in approval.

 **A/N: In canon, Ted Tonks fled rather than submit to the Muggle-born Registration Commission and subsequently died. In my 'verse, where Muggle-borns are registered and controlled by the Ministry, it is likely he fled to protect his family and is either dead or has left the country.**


	28. bequeathed

**_xxviii. bequeathed_**

Harriet Potter woke to a strange and puzzling sight.

She sat up from her mangled sheets bleary-eyed and mussy-headed—Livi complaining at the sudden draft created by the shifting covers—and stared at the odd blurs cluttering the foot of her bed. Harriet didn't remember dropping anything on the bed before going to bed, so someone must have put it there after she went to sleep.

"Wazzit?"

Several moments and mumbled curses left the sleepy girl before she could find her glasses and stir the lanterns into something brighter than a dim blush. Crowded on top of her trunk and the end of her bed were several boxes wrapped in silver and green paper. One had a bow.

 _Bloody hell_ , she had Christmas presents!

Harriet had gotten gifts before from the Dursleys—if you could call them that. Sometimes she got old socks or secondhand clothes from the charity shop, and one year she got the wrapping paper that came off of Dudley's gifts, which she actually tacked up in the cupboard to make it pretty until Aunt Petunia snapped at her to take it down. The year she got absolutely nothing was the year the oven somehow turned itself up to "broil" and reduced Petunia's Christmas roast to cinders.

Harriet picked up the first present and recognized Elara's stilted handwriting on the tag. Inside the wrapping she found an old book that was considerably heavier than she expected, the cover most likely made of something more substantial than cardboard. Harriet couldn't see a title on the dusty binding, only some kind of crest with a tiny skull, three birds, and what looked like a blurb of French, though she wasn't certain. On the first page scrolled the words " _A Compendivm of Defense Against Magic Moste Dark: First Edition_." Below that Elara had written, " _For Harriet — to learn something that might surprise even Prof. Slytherin himself. Sincerely, Elara._ "

Harriet snorted.

There was another book in the next package from Hermione, this one brand new and glossy, the pages crisp and smelling of new ink: _101 Legendary Artefacts of the Wizarding World_. A cursory flip through the contents revealed a wealth of bright, moving pictures and the letter from Hermione was considerably longer and more verbose than Elara's had been. Harriet huffed with amusement when she thought of how her best friends seemed determined to make her just as brainy as they were, though Harriet knew she'd never have Hermione's knack for Charms or Elara's precision in Transfiguration. At least she didn't kill everything in Herbology.

The next package contained blank stationary that, to Harriet's surprise and unease, had the Potter family crest stamped across the top in green ink. This, too, came from Elara—but the letter was different, written in the smooth script of a Dicta-Quill rather than personal handwriting, signed with " _From the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black_." A note stuck to the bottom told Harriet that it was, according to Elara's uncle, a pure-blood tradition for Wizarding families to pass on gifts for the Yule to invite good fortune in the new year.

Indeed, the remainder of the gifts were from the families of her housemates—Malfoy and Greengrass, Nott and Runcorn, Goyle and Crabbe. Nothing extravagant was inside the Transfigured boxes, just simple things like new quills or Chocolate Frogs or fresh parchment, but Harriet thought it was an oddly generous tradition for the pure-bloods. Then again, wizards and witches were some of the most superstitious people she'd ever met and not all of the pure-bloods were snobs; some of the upper year Slytherins were quite nice, as were a few pure-blood kids in the other Houses Harriet shared classes with.

A final gift lingered, half caught in the crevice between the mattress and the footboard, soft and squishy as if whatever inside were made of cloth. Set hovered around the package more than he had the others and Harriet thought he might be excited, if spooky shadow dwellers with a penchant for throwing things could be excited. She shoved the rest of a Chocolate Frog in her mouth, then tore away the paper.

Cool, light fabric spilled from the open wrappings into Harriet's hands and she marveled at the feel of it, like water through her fingers—yet so alive, sparking with the sharp, crisp prickle of active magic. For half a second Harriet wondered if the cloth was cursed, then decided it didn't matter now since she'd already grabbed hold of it, and who would want to curse an eleven year-old?

She very pointedly ignored the memory of Neville Longbottom falling from his broom in November.

Further investigation proved the cloth to be a cloak of some time, adult in proportions with a deep hood and a slightly crooked hem, as if whoever had cut the fabric before stitching it had done so with something rough and uneven. Harriet nudged Livi's tail off of her lap and hopped to her feet, letting the cloak pool about her like a ridiculous cape. She found it rather old fashioned, the pattern on it distorted and difficult to decipher, the threads glinting like silver in the green glow of the lanterns.

Then Harriet folded the cloak around herself and _disappeared_.

"Bloody _hell!_ " Harriet swore, tripping on the hem she couldn't see, catching herself on the bedpost with a hand that was _there_ but wholly invisible to her eyes.

" _Misstresss?_ " Livi hissed from the tangled nest of sheets when Harriet rushed by to the full-length mirror hanging between the empty carrells. Her head appeared in the speckled glass—and that was it.

" _I'm invisible!_ " Harriet yelled at the snake as she threw the hood over her head so it vanished as well. Once fully immersed in the cloak she could see herself again under the cloth, Set pooling in a narrow puddle at her feet, lapping the cloak's hem, the lantern light strangely ethereal where it managed to peek through the cloak's impermeable weave.

Livi lifted his head from the blankets and lazily turned in Harriet's direction—only to pause. His tongue flickered in question. "… _Misstresss_?"

" _I'm here!_ " she told him, not quite able to hold back the laugh burbling in her chest. " _This cloak is amazing!_ "

Livi didn't seem to agree if his annoyed hissing was anything to go by. The Horned Serpent levered himself off the bed, silver belly touching the floor with an audible thump of dry scales upon stones, and made his way nearer Harriet, following the quick darting of his violet tongue. Once he found Harriet, he slithered under the cloak's rumpled edge and wound about her legs, using the witch's offered arm as a way to lever himself higher. " _Sss…thisss is ssstrange magic_ ," the snake said.

" _It's not cursed, is it?_ " Harriet asked, suddenly apprehensive.

" _I do not know. It sssmellss like you_."

" _Well that's helpful_ ," Harriet grumbled as she pulled off the cloak and carefully refolded it. She returned to the wrapping and poked about, looking for a card, and the search took several minutes before she managed to find it stuck in the crevice between the mattress and the bedrail. Huffing, Harriet pulled it out and read what was written there.

 _Your father left this cloak in my possession before he died. It is time I returned it to its proper owner. Use it well._

There was no name listed. Harriet traced the looping cursive letters and marveled at the cloak now settled on her lap. _It belonged to my dad?_ She had an entire vault in Gringotts of things that had belonged to her parents, and yet Harriet felt oddly attached to this strange bit of fabric. " _Use it well_ ," the note said. How did one go about being invisible _well_? To Harriet's knowledge, people typically wanted to be invisible to do nefarious things, like steal or sneak about. Harriet didn't want to steal anything and didn't much fancy sneaking about. _What should I use it for?_

Harriet tucked her new possessions away and nicked another Chocolate Frog from her stash of candy before heading out to the common room with Hermione's gift. Once in the hallway, however, she heard hushed, raspy whispering and—terrified of running into Snape again—Harriet tiptoed to the corridor's end and carefully peeked into the room proper.

"— _Vaisssey hass promissse_ ," said the portrait of a snake that hung above the empty hearth.

" _Does he?_ " replied Professor Slytherin, one elbow propped on the mantel, hand carelessly running through his hair. " _He's never shown much initiative in class_."

" _He readsss booksss on the magic forbidden by the old man by the fire late in the eveningsss_."

" _Hmm_ ," Slytherin responded. " _He shows interest, then_."

" _Yesss_ …." The snake bobbed in affirmation, its painted coils writhing beneath the roots of a great rowan tree.

" _And the first years?_ " the professor inquired. " _What have you noted of them_?"

Harriet held herself very still as she listened to the wizard speak in Parseltongue to the inanimate serpent. _He has the snake spy on us!_ She quickly tried to think of any snake she'd ever see in the castle portraits, then had to relent, because it wasn't like Professor Slytherin could _only_ speak to snakes. He could talk to painted people just fine as well.

" _The blond hatchling ssspeakss often of his sssire_."

" _That would be Malfoy's get_ ," Slytherin scoffed. " _Lucius acknowledges Gaunt's authority over my own. A fool, but a fool who has always sought influence over true power. He will most likely be a loss. Pity. Tell me of Nott_."

" _He ssstudiess his booksss with great fervor_."

" _Excellent._ " Professor Slytherin paused then, one long finger tapping his bottom lip. " _And what of Potter?_ "

Harriet pressed herself into the wall with all her strength and thought it a marvel she didn't just sink into it.

" _I do not know thisss name_."

" _Black hair. Bespectacled. The smallest of the first years—the runt of the litter, if you will_."

Harriet bristled.

The snake lisped in irritation. " _Ssshe is a ssstrange hatchling_."

" _How so_?"

" _Alwaysss…whissspering…._ "

" _Odd_."

At this point Harriet thought it prudent to retreat before she could be discovered and quickly eased back to her dorm. She could've kicked herself for being so careless; sometimes she spoke to Set when she passed through the common room on her own. Being Muggle-raised, Harriet often forgot the bloody portraits not only _moved_ but also _saw_ and _heard_ and _spoke—_ and apparently Professor Slytherin used them to spy on his students, finding out if they had _promise_ or not.

Promise for what was the real question, and Harriet wasn't sure she wanted to know the answer.

She went back to her dorm, locking the door for good measure.

xXxXx

Harriet didn't leave the dungeons until supper time, when she scuttled out through the empty common room and all but ran to the lighter, warmer parts of the castle. She could hear voices coming from the Great Hall, mostly adult, but with a few younger laughs interspersed between the deeper droning, and the smell of cooked meat, potatoes, and baked bread had drool pooling in Harriet's mouth. She sighed with relief—until she looked into the hall and found only one table waiting for her. Comfy purple armchairs surrounded it, with one seat open by Professor Selwyn, and another by bloody Longbottom.

Scrunching her nose, Harriet took the place by Longbottom and the Weasleys. "Happy Christmas—err, Yule!"

The Gryffindors blinked in surprise at her presence.

"Oi," Neville muttered as he glowered, his voice low enough to escape the ears of the arrayed professors. "Why don't you go sit with the other slimy Slytherins?"

As one, the Gryffindors and Harriet glanced toward the opposing end of the table where Professor Slytherin sat with Snape and Selwyn on either side of him, their faces all set in a unique kind of grimace achieved by the truly cantankerous during times of excessive joy. In fact, it appeared they'd largely Vanished any of the decorations that had dared spilled in their direction, though none of the other professors had the same problem.

"Is that—is that a serious question?" Harriet asked as she piled potatoes onto her plate. "Because I could give you about half a dozen reason why I'd rather drink Bubotuber pus." Harriet would bet a sack full of Galleons she'd get half a dozen detentions from Snape for breathing the same air as him.

The Weasley twins snorted into their pumpkin juice. Neville might have protested, but Ron nudged him in the ribs and said, "Leave off, Nev, the food's gonna get cold!" so Longbottom harrumphed, sticking a bite of chicken into his mouth. Harriet looked over the Gryffindors and noted that Ron and his brothers—including Percy, who sat by the Arithmancy teacher chatting with fervor—all had on thick, woolly sweaters. Given how frigid the dungeons were, Harriet gazed rather wistfully at their attire.

"I like your sweater," she told Ron, who flushed. "Was it a gift for Ch—Yule?"

"Yeah," Fred—his sweater had a large 'F' stitched into the threads, so Harriet _guessed_ he was Fred—said as he chewed. She knew the twins by the rather terrible reputation they had in Slytherin. "Mum sends one every year."

"We'll have to tell her an itty-bitty snakey admired her handiwork," George put in. "What's your name, anyway?"

"Harriet Potter."

"Potter, Potter…say, aren't you the girl who punched Ickle Ronnikins?"

Harriet blushed and mumbled into her food. "I said I was sorry."

Fred and George burst into laughter, earning several curious glances from the professors. "Brilliant, that," George said with a wide grin. "Poor Ronni gettin' nipped by baby Slytherins."

Harriet huffed and cast a sympathetic look in Ron's direction, who continued to stuff his face and ignored his brothers' pestering, asking Neville to pass the butter dish. The meal progressed easily enough, the bubbly professor on Harriet's other side striking up a lively conversation about her subject—Ghoul Studies, of all things, which she taught part-time to the sixth and seventh years who wished to take the class. Crackers made an appearance and Harriet pulled one with a reluctant Longbottom, getting showered in red confetti, tiny lion figurines that moved about on their own, and a small green snake—which Harriet quickly secreted into a robe pocket, lest it terrify the Gryffindors.

"Say," she asked once dessert was well underway and a few professors had departed. Selwyn made a quick escape, but Snape lingered and had his head tilted toward Dumbledore's ear, speaking in a low whisper that had the Headmaster nodding his head every so often. Slytherin surveyed the table, lost in thought. "If you were invisible, what would you do?"

"Is this one of those morality tests?" George asked, licking a bit of icing from his thumb. "Like if you have two kids on either side of a Nundu who do you save?"

"The answer's always the handsomest twin," Fred stage whispered.

"Wh—no," Harriet said. _What in the world is a Nundu_? "No, I mean like if you could go about Hogwarts invisible, what would you do?"

They considered that for a time, bouncing ideas off each other, which included and were not limited to sneaking into the Slytherin common room, Snape's store room, and the girl's locker room—the latter earning a harsh look from Harriet and placating hand waves from the redheaded twins. Ron perked up and, after swallowing, said, "I know! The Restricted Section! We could find out more about N—."

Neville kicked Ron under the table hard enough to jostle the flatware and Ron choked on his treacle tart.

Harriet frowned at their not so subtle behavior but otherwise pushed it aside, thinking about the suggestion. She _was_ rather curious about the Restricted Section, about what kind of books and magic were considered too dangerous for casual viewing—and she wondered what Neville Longbottom could possibly want or _need_ from the Restricted Section of all places. The boy loved to boast about all the tutors and fantastic places he'd been to over the years, and all Harriet could think about was how she'd been stuffed in a cupboard or scrubbing toilets while Longbottom had been scaling mountaintops or saving a village or something equally exciting and distinctly un-Dursley.

She sighed and popped a spoon of blueberry ice cream into her mouth.

Slytherin rose from his seat, dismissing his napkin with a negligible wave of his hand, the volume of conversation dipping around him as he strolled out of the Great Hall without a backward glance. Harriet shivered. _He gives me the creeps_. Was that how other Houses saw Slytherins? Ill at the thought, she set down her spoon and considered the Gryffindors she sat with. They chatted as they ate, the twins still bent on figuring out the very best mischief one could get into while invisible, Ron rolling his eyes while Neville ate his pudding. No, they didn't see her as they did her Head of House. Whatever Professor Slytherin was, Harriet wasn't anything like him.

She was glad for that.

xXxXx

Harriet was having second thoughts.

Originally, the idea of venturing through Hogwarts' corridors in the dead of night had been exciting, tinged with a bit of forbidden thrill and open curiosity. Now Harriet was faced with the very real prospect of venturing through the frigid, echoing dark of a castle _literally_ haunted by ghosts and patrolling professors like Snape and Slytherin.

Hogwarts became sinister at night once the students were tucked into bed and the torches doused. Harriet shivered beneath the cloak as she inched out of the common room and found herself in a hall too black to see anything at all. She fumbled for the cloak's edge until she could poke out a single hand and press it against the stone wall as a guide. The cold burned against Harriet's skin and she hissed in a breath, bundling her fingers in her sleeve before touching the stones again. She hurried forward.

 _I'm glad I don't have Prefect duty; this place is too spooky_ , the young Slytherin thought as her soft footsteps echoed in the entrance hall, moonlight splayed on the floor, wavering through the thundering clouds. She could barely tell where she was in the dark.

Harriet had almost reached the floor where the library could be found when she heard sobbing. Muffled sniffling drifted from the open door of an empty classroom, and when Harriet inched nearer to see who it was, she saw a professor standing hunched in-between the sparse whorls of moonlight coming through the frosted windows. He wore a purple turban, a dark olive cloak—and sobbed into his cupped hands.

"I'm _trying_ , Master—. I can't—. I can't—."

He sobbed again, harder, then abruptly stopped, sucking in a breath and no small amount of snot. He whipped around and Harriet scuttled backward as if she were visible, which she was wasn't, of course. Seeing him clearer, Harriet realized the wizard was the Muggle Studies professor. Terrence Higgs pointed him out when she asked about the subject at lunch one time—pointed him out with the kind of sneering snark most Slytherin reserved for anything even remotely Muggle in distinction. She couldn't remember the wizard's name.

He passed her by and heat struck Harriet's neck like a thousand stinging needles abruptly diving into the flesh of her shoulder and throat. A gasp left Harriet but the wizard kept sniffling as he shuffled off, covering the sound. The pain lasted only a moment, then vanished as it'd never been; Harriet, however, kept her hand clasped her neck as if to ward off a second bout. She watched the teacher until he wandered out of sight.

 _Slytherin's not the only one who gives me the creeps_.

Harriet waited several minutes and took several steadying breaths before she turned—and saw Professor Snape standing at the corridor's end.

Standing there, staring _at_ _Harriet_.

 _But that's impossible_ , she told herself as she stood perfectly still. Snape did the same. _He couldn't possibly_ —.

Snape took three furious steps forward and lunged before Harriet could do more than jump, the Potions Master snatching the cloak right off her head. " _Potter!_ "

"How do you do that?!" Harriet blurted out before she could think better of it. "Can you see through all invisible stuff or—?"

Professor Snape loomed overhead and Harriet's blathering dwindled. The girl gulped.

"Thirty points from Slytherin!" he snarled. "What kind of absolute _idiocy_ would lead you to believe wandering the school in the middle of the night was permissible? I had hoped you were beyond such puerile arrogance. _What_ do you have to say for yourself, hmm?"

"Err—." Harriet blinked at the man as he continued to silently fume. "What's—what's _puerile_ , sir?"

"Childish, Miss Potter! Childish!" Snape hissed. "Return to your dorm! _Immediately_!"

"But what about—?" She reached for the cloak still hanging from his pale fist and Snape pulled it out of reach, the hem fluttering against Harriet's fingertips.

"Oh no," he said, voice returning to the cold, soft intonation she was used to. Harriet thought of it as like getting jabbed by a metal knife instead of being bludgeoned with a club. "I believe I'll be confiscating this."

Harriet opened her mouth to argue and Snape gave her a glare so ferocious she thought she might just be immolated on the spot if she so much as breathed funny. " _Go_ , Miss Potter. Or do we need to wake Professor Slytherin and have this discussion with your Head of House?"

Harriet went. Snape followed her all the way down to the dungeons again, though not into the common room itself. He stood beyond the open passage door with her cloak stuffed into a robe pocket, and as the stones grated against stone, preparing to close, the professor said, "One last thing, Potter."

"…yes, sir?"

Snape grinned and it was not a nice look at all. "That'll be another week of detentions."

The passage closed, leaving nothing but a blank stretch of wall behind.

"Well, _shit_."


	29. pure-blood

_**xxix. pure-blood**_

The scarlet steam engine idled by the platform and perfumed the air with the heavy smell of carbon and ash. Hermione, bundled in her coat and scarf, paused just beyond the empty barrier onto the station and sighed, puffs of white still slipping through the loose weave of her emerald scarf.

Hermione Granger loved her parents. Truly. Her childhood had been filled with love and trips to educational locales and warm Sunday afternoons spent in the den reading together or watching telly. She would read the paper over her father's shoulder. She would play checkers with her mum, knees tucked under the coffee table, a furrow of thought digging between her mum's brows as she considered the board. Dr and Dr Granger were genuine and affectionate parents.

However, Hermione knew they weren't very _understanding_.

The Grangers never much enjoyed Hermione's insatiable quest for knowledge. To be certain, having a bright child was a joy, but when curiosity turned into near-obsession, a need to question everything right down into the atoms of its creation, that brightness becomes a curse. Her parents would feed Hermione's inquisitive nature to a point, then say " _Enough, Hermione_ ," with exasperated sighs and brow rubbing.

They had no comprehension of magic. To them, magic was the trade of backroom peddlers and shabbily dressed charlatans on stage; it was all theatrical, pulling rabbits from hats and yanking loads of handkerchiefs from one's sleeve—smoke, mirrors, and a bit of glamour. The Grangers let their daughter go with Minerva McGonagall in hopes of Hermione learning better control over herself and her rabid curiosity, and after a few months missing her presence, they'd come to fully understand they'd sent their only child into a realm beyond their own. There'd be no Oxford for Hermione, no future as a lawyer or a doctor or a dentist like her parents. By sending her into the world of magic, they'd effectively cut off feasibility of her ever functioning in their own.

The Granger spent much of their two weeks together attempting to convince her staying home and not returning would be best. Hermione knew that wasn't an option—not that she wished to leave Hogwarts behind anyway. From the moment Hermione stepped foot across her threshold and took Professor McGonagall's hand, her parents ceded all guardianship rights over to the hands of the Ministry, and in the eyes of judicial circumstance, she was Hermione Malfoy, ward of the Most Noble House of Malfoy and subsequently held to a contract that wouldn't be completed until September nineteenth, 1996. To the Ministry, Hermione Granger no longer existed.

She loved her parents. She'd greatly looked forward to spending the holiday with them, and yet the more the Grangers persisted in disparaging magic, the more Hermione felt as if they were again telling her she was _too much_ , that magic was just one element _too much_ in their otherwise practical daughter they wished she could be rid of. Hermione could no more quit being magical than a cat could quit being feline. She spent the final days of break in her room, longing for Hogwarts, for Harriet and Elara and a comfortable four poster beneath a murky lake.

Hermione's stomach flipped with guilt when she glanced one last time at the barrier before walking away.

The majority of students returned home for the Christmas—Yule—holidays and yet few filled the compartments, most lingering still on the platform, procrastinating to the very last minute to wring out the last drop of vacation they could. Hermione boarded the train and thought of finding an empty compartment—until she saw a familiar face and burst into a wide grin.

"Elara!" she said as she eased the door open and dragged her trunk behind her. "Can I sit here?"

The pure-blood girl lifted her eyes from the book in her hands and smiled in turn, a hesitant look Hermione might have taken offense at before she came to learn more about the youngest Black daughter. "Of course," she said. Hermione jerked her trunk over the threshold and let the door clatter shut. Using her wand, she cast a quick _Wingardium Leviosa_ , and the trunk settled neatly on the rack. Hermione sighed when she sat because using magic again after abstaining for two weeks was a joy.

 _And to think I haven't even been a witch for a full year._ She paused. _Well, technically, I've always been a witch, haven't I?_

"Did you have a pleasant holiday?" Hermione asked. Elara closed her book on her hand, using a thumb to hold her place, and gave Hermione her attention.

"Not…entirely. My uncle passed on."

"Oh, I'm so sorry. You mentioned he was ill, but I didn't know…." Of course she hadn't known. Elara was particularly quiet and answered most personal questions with blank stares or utter passivity.

"I had hoped for more time. I was quite busy with the arrangements afterward."

 _What does she mean by that? Why would_ she _be busy with such things when she's only eleven?_

"How was your vacation, Hermione?"

She pushed such thoughts away and smiled. "It was—nice." Hermione left out the strange anxiety that had prevailed in her warm but nonetheless mundane home. "Mum and dad wanted to get out of country for a bit, but opted to stay home in the end."

"Read anything interesting?"

Now that was a question Hermione could answer at length, and she did so with pleasure, rambling off about the very book Elara had sent her for Christmas from the House of Black library, an tome about old and more dubious Charms. Hermione knew if a prig like Draco or, God forbid, Mr or Mrs Malfoy knew Elara was distributing books out of the family library to a Mudblood like her, they'd go ballistic. She expressed interest in seeing the Black library in its entirety, then winced at how heavy-handed she sounded. Elara simply smiled again.

"I would invite you and Harriet over during the summer, but the house is…not in the best repair."

"Oh, that's okay, I didn't mean to invite myself over." Hermione nibbled on her lower lip and wondered why she suddenly felt so anxious. Then, she realized this was the first time she'd been alone with Elara and her presence was…singular. Normally Harriet would be there, ignorant to any awkward tension—well, not _ignorant_ so much as uncaring. The bespectacled girl could be quite persistent and read Elara's silences and minute shifts in expression better than Hermione did. "I hope Harriet had fun staying at Hogwarts."

Elara grimaced. "She sent Cygnus home with a letter. Apparently Snape's been giving her detention."

"No! Why would he do that?"

"Because he's a miserable bat." Elara scowled at the air before her. Professor Snape always snarled over Elara's terribly botched Potions, so Hermione assumed the dislike was mutual. "He's the sort. After all, aren't you of the opinion he cursed Longbottom in November?"

She had been, but a trip to the library after the match had proved Elara correct in her guess that Professor Snape could have just as easily been reciting the counter-curse. "I'm not sure." It wasn't very Slytherin to curse people out in the open; oh, they'd do it in a dark alley without witnesses, but in the middle of a stadium? No, that showed no finesse, no skill. Sloppy.

"He acts oddly around her," Elara said, her eyes hard.

"How so?"

"He…hesitates."

Hermione didn't understand what she meant by that and, frustrated, went to ask the other girl to clarify—when the door clattered open again.

"Granger," drawled Draco Malfoy in a chilling, if childish, mimicry of Mr Malfoy. "Back from the Muggles, are you?"

"Hello, Draco, pleasant holiday?" Hermione asked through her teeth, wanting more than anything to set the pointy little toady on fire. She checked that urge, however, before her wishes became reality.

Draco sniffed and lifted his sharp nose into the air as Goyle and Crabbe stood silent and bored behind him, blocking part of the corridor. The train had set out some minutes ago, though parts of outer London still flashed by the windows. "You didn't come to our Yule ball."

Hermione's mind flashed back to the gilded invitation she'd received via owl post, the one she'd thrown into the fire after penning a succinct reply. "I was with my parents," she said by way of explanation. Really, she thought it should be obvious.

Malfoy sneered. "You're a witch, Granger, and it's tradition! You don't celebrate _Christmas_ anymore."

"There's a difference between being proud of heritage and being a bigot, Malfoy," Elara interrupted. She opened her book again and prepared herself to settle in with such carefree indifference, Hermione was beginning to believe the pure-bloods might really have that cold, haughty look encoded in their DNA. "Learn it."

"Watch your mouth, Black," Malfoy spat. "Or people will start thinking you're a Mudblood loving fool, too."

"I have no love for Muggles," Elara responded with a shrug, causing Hermione to flinch with surprise and considerable hurt. "Nor whatever diatribe you mean to spew."

"Father's quite upset with you, you know. He's been to the Ministry and they're going to overturn the emancipation. You should watch yourself, blood-traitor."

"The list of things I don't care about is quite long; even so, the concerns of Lucius Malfoy and his feeble-mouthed son might just top it."

Hermione thought it unfair that, even when flushing with rage, Malfoy was still pretty in that prim, affluent mien of his. She had always been an ugly crier. Goyle and Crabbe shuffled in the background and looked eager to be off, seeing as they didn't have the skills to counter Elara's savage repertoire.

"Good day, cousin," the pure-blood girl said with finality, disappearing behind her book. Malfoy stood and gawked for a moment longer, then allowed himself to be encouraged into the corridor and out of sight by his bored friends. Once the door rolled shut, Elara lowered the book again, looking cross, and yanked the shades down on the windows.

"What's this about an emancipation?" Hermione asked for lack of knowing what else to say. Oh, she had plenty she _wanted_ to say, but the words vied for dominance and created a traffic jam in her head.

"My uncle," Elara began as she closed the book again and, with a sigh, dropped it on the seat at her side. "He assured my emancipation before he passed on so I—and, by extension, the House of Black—wouldn't be slipped into Malfoy's pocket. Malfoy's been to the Ministry to throw a tantrum, of course, but there's nothing he can do about it."

"Do you really not like Muggles?" Hermione asked, unable to keep the hurt out of her voice. Yes, she was a witch—but Hermione had been raised a Muggle, _was_ a Muggle-born, and to hear that someone she considered one of her best friends might hold that heritage against her was almost more than Hermione could take.

Elara must have seen the pain in Hermione's eyes because her irritated expression eased to something softer. "I think it's more appropriate to say I don't like people in general," she replied with a crooked smile. Pausing, she then began to unbutton her cuffs, rolling them back to reveal pale, skinny wrists. Given that Hermione had never seen the other girl dressed less than perfectly and completely covered, even when she woke up late and surly in the mornings, she couldn't help but glance at the skin bared to the afternoon sunlight.

Scars marred Elara's arms, puckered and pink, not quite new but definitely not old either. Horrified, Hermione initially thought they were evidence of Elara hurting herself. The thought turned Hermione's stomach with worry, until she noted how thick the scars were, the flesh torn rather than sliced, amassed mostly about the mound of her palms and the lower portions of her thumb joints. If she had to be objective, Hermione would say it looked as if…as if her wrists had been _bound_ by something restrictive, unyielding, something like handcuffs, and she'd tried very hard to rip them off.

"The place I lived before, the people there, were much like the Malfoys. The kind of people who justify what the Dark Lord did, just as the Dark Lord justifies what _they_ do. They prescribed to a particular dogma and felt themselves justified in harming those who were different from themselves."

"That is foul," Hermione said, shaken, staring. " _Foul_. Why haven't you gone to Madam Pomfrey? Or Dumbledore? Or—or—!" She didn't want to say Professor Slytherin. Their Head of House was terrifying.

"Because it's done. I'm not going back there. I don't want to talk about it."

"But—."

" _No_ , Hermione." With that, Elara quickly pushed her sleeves back into place and redid the buttons. She kept her eyes averted.

Hermione didn't know what to say. Elara had only spoke of her prior home once or twice and had referred to it as ' _that place_ ' or ' _those people_.' Still, Hermione couldn't have guessed this kind of trauma lay beneath Elara's steely exterior, her inflexible need to remain unnoticed and in control of herself. The part of Hermione that was ' _too much_ ' wanted to urge the other girl to tell someone who could _do_ something, someone who could fix that horrendous scarring or take away the flinty, hateful gleam in Elara's pale eyes. _Someone_ had to be able to help.

Hermione closed her mouth. She stood from her seat, then sat next to Elara. The other girl stiffened, but as the minutes passed and the train continued to rattle around them, laughter echoing in the corridor, she finally relaxed. "Don't tell Harriet," Elara whispered.

"Why ever not?"

"She has her own problems to deal with."

That brought an end to the conversation. The two witches sat in silence as the world continued to change beyond the gentle rocking of the train's carriage. Hermione watched the countryside and considered just how little she truly knew about her best friends' lives.


	30. a breath before the storm

**_xxx. a breath before the storm_**

On the evening students were set to return to Hogwarts, Harriet came barreling out of the dungeons and collided with something solid.

"For Merlin's sake, Potter," Professor Slytherin grunted, one hand pressed to the place on his chest Harriet had smacked with her head. " _Do_ watch where you're going!"

Harriet backpedaled and would have tumbled down the steps behind her had Slytherin not grabbed hold of her arm. His grip chafed and Harriet winced, then gave a swift apology before hurrying on. Slytherin hissed " _Rude child_ ," behind her. Harriet almost froze, shocked by his open usage of Parseltongue, but she wasn't meant to understand that, so Harriet kept running. _Odd_ , she mused. _I thought I'd imagined it, but_ _his accent really is different from mine, even in a snake language._

Scratching her neck, Harriet entered the entrance hall and dodged around the few older students who'd already arrived, sliding on the ice that encased the outer steps, though she kept her balance and hopped into the snow. Others weren't as lucky; they laid scattered and rumpled, complaining as McGonagall used her wand to warm the stones and scolded those who swore within her hearing. Harriet shivered in the wind and gave a thought for her cloak down in the dormitories.

"Harriet!"

Coming up the path from the line of creepy horse-pulled carriages strode Hermione and Elara, both panting heavily as they trekked through the sludge. A wide grin spread across Harriet's face as she set off again, weaving through the crowd, her feet small and light enough to skate over the snow where others sunk deep. She felt like one of the elves from the Tolkien books Aunt Petunia had burned. Hermione let out a small shriek when Harriet threw her arms around her and they toppled into a drift, Elara evading a similar fate by jumping aside.

"Miss _Potter—!"_ McGonagall admonished, only for her attention to be diverted by a sixth year Ravenclaw toppling into a third year.

Giggling, Harriet rolled onto her back and sunk into the snow while Elara pulled Hermione to her feet.

"Harriet, you're going to freeze to death, you're not even wearing your cloak!"

"Don't care," she said with a sigh as the air escaped her in a white plume. "I haven't been outside in _days_ thanks to Professor bloody Snape."

"Did he really give you all those detentions?"

" _Yes!_ He even gave me two in one day. For lookin' at him funny."

Hermione managed to pry her out of the ice. "You aren't serious. You _can't_ be, that'd be monstrous."

"I think his exact words were ' _If you can sit there glaring at me, Miss Potter, you can spend an hour in the dungeons glaring at the wall_ '."

Snorting, Elara wrapped an arm about the shorter girl's shoulders to bring her into the shelter of her own cloak. Hermione started plucking dead leaves out of the unholy tangle of her hair. "That does sound like Snape, Hermione."

The older Slytherin huffed with disapproval.

"I've missed you two lots," Harriet said. "Hogwarts isn't the same without you."

"We missed you too, Harriet."

 **xXxXx**

The oddest thing about classes resuming was Snape's sudden switch in attitude.

He went right back to ignoring Harriet, like a cobweb too far up on the ceiling to be bothered with, or an ugly painting you pass by without giving it any real thought. Her detentions came to an abrupt halt the afternoon the rest of the student body arrived, and so baffling was the change, Harriet knocked a beaker off her desk on purpose in Potions to see what he'd do. Snape just sneered and continued pacing the class.

 _He's a confusing bloke._

"I bet he was trying to keep you out of trouble," Hermione said one afternoon as they ascended from the dungeons and headed toward the Great Hall for lunch. "Being the only Slytherin here over break. Honestly, Professor Snape seems to take over most of the Head duties. Professor Slytherin just—." Hermione waved a hand in a vague gesture.

"Slithers about?" Harriet put in.

"Creeps?" Elara muttered, earning a titter from the bespectacled girl.

"Stalks?"

" _Will_ you two be quiet before someone hears you?" Hermione hissed as they came into the Great Hall proper. They edged nearer the Slytherin table, pausing only to let a group of sneering fourth year Gryffindor boys pass before reaching their seats.

"I don't get into trouble," Harriet insisted as platters and full cups of pumpkin juice appeared before them.

"You _did_ drop a beaker on Professor Snape's foot," Hermione told her.

Elara spooned green beans onto her plate. "And then headbutted him in the thigh when you bent down to retrieve it."

"It's his own bloody fault for standing so close," Harriet grumbled, cheeks red. "Don't take his side; he stole my new cloak! Says I won't get it back until I 'learn some responsibility.' What does that even mean? How does one _learn_ responsibility? I'm plenty responsible!"

"Well, what did you expect to happen when you went out after curfew with it?"

"I expected to be invisible, that what." Harriet popped a biscuit into her mouth and chewed. She thought there might be something funny about Snape's eye; during the detentions he'd assigned later in the evenings, she'd seen how he'd always rub at his scarred left eye after brewing something particularly smelly or reading a clutch of essays. How else could he see through the cloak? How else could he see Livi? The ruddy snake could cross the dorm and steal all the food in the bowl laid out for Bulstrode's cat without anyone any the wiser but Snape always stared whenever Livi poked his snout outside her collar.

Harriet stuck another biscuit into her mouth and Parkinson, seated across the table, grimaced. "You eat like an animal, Potter," she complained. "Were you raised in a _barn_?"

"Close 'nough," Harriet replied, memories of the cupboard and sitting alone in the dark, listening to the Dursleys eat, flashing through her mind. She smacked her lips just to irritate Pansy. Parkinson voiced her revulsion and turned away.

Hermione and Elara took it upon themselves to slip servings of foods healthier than sugary biscuits onto Harriet's plate as conversation turned away from their prickly Potions professor. "I must have read a dozen theory books on the Shield Charm during the holiday and still can't cast it as well as you can, Harriet. I just don't understand. Of course, I'm doing better than most in our class, but the practical spells just aren't as fluid as yours, no matter how often I practice."

Shrugging, Harriet pointed out that she still managed to turn her matches into javelins half of the time in Transfiguration. Recently they'd moved on to changing plants into various inanimate things and Harriet's almost always turned out over-sized or oddly disproportionate, though she _was_ getting better.

"I was actually reading the book you got me for Christm—Yule, Elara, and it talked all about Shield Charms."

"Really?" Hermione asked, interest piqued. "I've read about _Protego Duo_ and _Protego Totalum_ , though the latter is considered far beyond our current ability."

Harriet gave her head a quick, sharp nod. "There's _loads_ more—all of them made to counter specific elements or objects, making them stronger or weaker than plain Shield Charms, depending on when you use them. There's _Protego Impervius,_ against water based spells, and _Protego Flammae_ against fire—and harder stuff like _Protego Mente Malitiae_ , which is supposed to ward away spells of 'ill intent,' and _Protego Visus_ , which I gather is a bit like a Notice-Me-Not? I didn't really understand that part. It's supposed to make you harder to concentrate on and takes a barmy amount of wand-work if the diagrams were anything to go by."

"Can I borrow this book?"

"'Course," Harriet said. "Look, I've been practicing the one that conjures water shields—." Making sure no one else was paying attention, she drew her wand from its brace on her wrist and held it under the table, out of view. Like a typical _Protego_ , the charm required a sharp downward slash, but before that she needed to preform a gesture similar to the alchemical symbol for 'water,' an inverted triangle created with three rapid, tight twitches with the wand made from the wrist rather than her fingers. Harriet performed the proper motions, then whispered " _Protego Flammae_."

Properly done, the spell was meant to conjure water in a wispy shield reminiscent of the thin, milky sheen of a plain _Protego_ , but Harriet must have done something wrong, because the moment the words crossed her lips, every goblet in the Great Hall burst, sending their contents flying ten feet into the air before raining back down. Students shrieked as they were doused in pumpkin juice and tea. Most of the professors managed to throw _Impervius_ Charms over themselves, though Selwyn bellowed when he caught a face full of hot cider on its way up, and Dumbledore actually laughed at the madness unfolding before him. Snape and Slytherin looked murderous.

Harriet just gawked in horror.

She didn't resist when Elara cinched an arm about her own and all but yanked her from the bench. Others had jumped to their feet as well, and it looked like a full food fight had broken out at the Gryffindor table much to McGonagall's despair. Elara swiftly led Harriet right out of the Great Hall's doors with Hermione scrambling after them, pale and speckled with juice.

"And here I thought you were saying you _don't_ get into trouble," Elara said once they'd made it into the entrance hall with a few miffed Ravenclaws clutching damp books to their chests. "That certainly looked like trouble."

"I don't know what happened," Harriet complained. "I did it all right in the dorm over break. Here lemme—." She whipped out her wand, fully intending to try the Charm once more—when Hermione lunged for her arm, pushing it down. "What are you—?"

"Hey, Potter!"

Two of the Ravenclaws had stowed away their texts in their school bags and approached. Harriet recognized them as Terry Boot and Anthony Goldstein, the former lanky and brown-haired, the latter boasting a shock of blond locks atop his head. "W-what?"

"You were the one who cast that spell, right?"

Harriet sputtered. "Wh—? No, of course not. Why would I do something like that?"

Terry's eyes dropped to her wand with a bemused expression and Harriet quickly stuffed it into her sleeve, her cheeks bright pink.

"Can you teach us how to do it?" he asked, genuine curiosity in his bright eyes. "I haven't seen anything like it. It would have amazing uses."

"Er—," Harriet hedged, fiddling with the edge of her sleeve, her face still warm. "That, uh, wasn't really what it was meant to do—not that I'm admitting it was me who cast it."

Terry grinned. "Do you think you could show us how it went wrong?"

"It only works with liquid that is already present," Hermione interrupted. "The original is meant to coalesce it from the air, like an _Aguamenti_ Charm. What _practical_ use would you have for a spell that throws all open liquids within a hundred yards into the air?"

"Well, it could be really useful, couldn't it?" Anthony replied, earnest. "Like you said, water conjuring Charms can only make use of what is already there, typically what is atmospheric and gaseous. What if your spell could be used to move an underground spring closer to the surface? Imagine the impact that could have on Herbologists and Wizarding farmers!"

Hermione's mouth popped open and she got that glassy-eyed look Harriet recognized as one of her overly thoughtful expressions. "But that's _brilliant_. I thought you wanted the spell for a _prank_ or something ridiculous like that…."

Harriet didn't think that. Ravenclaws, from what she'd seen, found witty jokes like riddles far funnier than anything physical like a food fight. She followed along with the conversation, though she thought it a bit too dry and theoretical for her tastes when Hermione, Terry, and Anthony devolved into a conversation about magical agriculture and the limitations of duplicating matter for consumption.

"Honestly," Harriet grumbled to Elara. "They're _eleven_. Where do they find time to think about all this stuff?"

Elara shrugged.

In the end, the Ravenclaws convinced Harriet to teach them the _Protego Flammae_ Charm, and after dinner they all gathered in an empty classroom on the first floor and tried to recreate the spell. They didn't manage to explode anymore goblets, but before Filch came to chase them back to their dormitories at curfew, all five of first years could create a passable water shield. They returned to their beds sopping wet and tired, but also rather pleased with their progress.

Overall, Harriet was glad everything was back to normal at Hogwarts.


	31. like an untimely frost

**_xxxi. like an untimely frost_**

Yawning, Harriet leaned an elbow on the planter's edge and watched the Plufferupherius sob.

"I really don't know what happened," Elara said as she wrung her gloved hands and the plant's weeping increased. Professor Sprout gave her a stern look worthy of Professor McGonagall and Elara winced. "Really, Professor, I don't understand why this always happens. I'm not doing it on _purpose_ , and I—."

The Plufferupherius' yellow petals drooped as it wailed and leaned away from Elara. Professor Sprout rolled her eyes and used a pair of pruners to nip off the blackened stem Elara had inadvertently touched while they'd been collecting the orange pollen. Their station was covered in the stuff now, their gloves stained from trying to sweep it up when the plant wheezed and threw a tantrum. Needless to say, Professor Sprout was less than impressed, which meant Harriet and Elara had to stay behind the rest of the class and try to explain themselves.

"I've never met a jinx quite so cursed as you, lass," Sprout said as she set the dead branch on the counter and stroked one callused finger down the Plufferupherius' prickly stem. The strange plant shivered and fell quiet, swaying slightly under her practiced ministrations. "We may need to 'ave a word with your Head of H—." She stopped, an odd expression crossing her face. "With Professor Dumbledore about that. Going forward next year we're going to be handling more of my rarer specimens and I can't 'ave you killing them." Sprout tutted, lost in thought. "Finish up your cleaning, then hurry to dinner, girls."

She shuffled off to check a few of her other plants in the greenhouse as Harriet and Elara hurried to brush the rest of the pollen into the folded parchment they'd been using to funnel the sticky granules into their vial. The Plufferupherius ignored Harriet but kept its eyes—well, the twiggy part Harriet thought it _must_ see with—suspiciously trained on the Elara the whole time. Elara frowned at the dowdy little shrub and it sniffled, shedding more pollen. Harriet grimaced.

"I'm sorry for keeping you," Elara said. "You should probably partner with someone else in this class."

Harriet waved a hand. "I don't mind. Gardening's not all that bad; I used to do all the yard work for my aunt, you know." She managed to sweep up the last of the dust with the parchment's edge. "This stuff reminds me of the pollen that comes off lilies—meaning it gets bloody everywhere." The Plufferupherius gave her a scandalized look and sobbed. "Oh, budge up, you cry baby."

Glancing toward Elara, Harriet saw that the other girl had plucked the dead branch from the counter's edge. She held it between thumb and forefinger, twirling it slightly, the branch black and shriveled to half its typical size as if every drop of moisture had been sucked out of it. As Harriet watched, the branched _changed_. Veins of green returned between the bark's cracked husk, like blood seeping beneath new skin, and tender little vines sprouted from the end. A white flower blossomed.

"Wh—how'd you do that?" Harriet asked, gob-smacked. Elara jumped as if she'd forgotten Harriet was there and chucked the branch into the rubbish bin.

"It's nothing," she said, stripping off her gloves.

"It didn't look like nothing. It looked like—."

" _Don't_."

Harriet had never heard Elara speak like that before; sharp, but quiet, like the sudden jab of a spear aimed toward a shark circling her sinking boat. Aunt Petunia used that voice when Harriet dared mention the dreaded ' _m_ ' word. Harriet was dreadfully curious; she knew what she'd seen and wouldn't be convinced otherwise, but she shrugged and went about tidying up. Elara shot her a gratified look.

 _She brought that branch back to life_ , Harriet thought. _But she didn't want me to know that. Why not say anything? Is it a Slytherin thing? Like Professor Snape telling me to keep my Parseltongue to myself?_

The two girls delivered the last of the pollen to Professor Sprout, who then shooed them out of the greenhouse and off toward the castle. They hurried along, the evening air brisk where the breeze chased itself up from the forest and through the open courtyard, though the sun hadn't quite yet receded fully. Dinner would be commencing by now, and Harriet longed for something hearty to eat, something that would tie her over through the evening. They had Astronomy that night as they did every Friday and Wednesday night, and reading through constellation charts was excruciating on an empty stomach.

" _There_ you two are!" Hermione said once Harriet and Elara slid into their places on the bench at Slytherin table. The merry raucous of dishes being shifted and laughter rising—especially from the Gryffindors—made it difficult to be heard in the Great Hall, but Hermione managed. "I was beginning to think you'd gone off to the dorms without dinner, and you _know_ we have Astronomy tonight."

"Elara would've been fine," Harriet put in as she nudged a tureen of gravy closer. "She's better at it than both us." She was, too; Astronomy and Transfiguration proved to be Elara's best subjects, better than Hermione even, if only slightly. Being an absolute wreck and Potions and Herbology balanced her out. "Besides, we saw you getting along _quite_ well with Mr Boot, didn't we, Elara?"

Elara smirked.

Hermione gave Harriet a look that said in no uncertain terms she did _not_ care for what the bespectacled girl was insinuating. "Terry and I were discussing our last Charms class."

"Really? How… _charming_."

Hermione whacked her arm with the back of a serving spoon.

"Ow."

"He was telling me about how their Head of House, Professor Flitwick, tutors the Ravenclaws on the weekends in their common room." She poured herself a glass of chilled milk and let out a huffy sigh. "It's unfair, don't you think? Our Head of House hardly seems to realize he _is_ a Head of House and I doubt he'd ever lower himself to tutoring first years on the weekend—let alone a _Muggle-born_." She scoffed and took a sip of her milk. "He's far more concerned with the upper years. I've only seen him in the common room twice if I remember correctly."

Harriet had a sudden recollection of tiptoeing from the dorm, disturbed by sibilant hisses rising in the otherwise empty common room. "I've seen him there," she told them in her gravest tone. Hermione's brow rose and Harriet glanced about at the other students. She would tell her friends more later, but too many ears were present to do so now. "But that _portrait_ above the hearth? You probably shouldn't go telling it all your secrets, if you catch my meaning."

Both Elara and Hermione were clever—cleverer than Harriet, she thought—so they took her meaning immediately. There were several hearths in the Slytherin common room, and yet only one had a picture hung above its mantel, and that picture held only one occupant—an occupant of the serpentine variation.

Elara did as Harriet had and checked around them for eavesdroppers. Across the table, Malfoy was busy puffing out his chest and drawling to Parkinson, who reveled in his attention while Crabbe and Goyle ate their dinners and grunted about a Quidditch game posted in the Prophet. No one ever took much note of three random Slytherin girls. "When did this occur?"

"Yule holiday," Harriet replied. She reached for the carafe of pumpkin juice—and a cup of steaming tea appeared just under her hand. Harriet didn't much fancy herself a tea drinker, having only ever got the cold, bitter slop in the bottom of the pot at the Dursleys, but a cuppa before heading off to the library for homework sounded lovely.

"And he was just—just in the common room? While you were _alone_?"

"Well, I was in the dorm at first. He didn't actually see me." She blew on the tea and took a sip. It still burned on the way down. "I'm not mad enough to go out there with him mucking about."

"It's still very strange."

"We've spoken before on Professor Slytherin's _oddity_ , Hermione. He—." Elara stopped and frowned. "Harriet, are you all right?"

Harriet's first reaction was to say "Fine," but she couldn't force the word past her lips. The burning she'd mistook as heat from the tea didn't abate and, instead, continued from her mouth into her throat and stomach, then her lungs. She choked as the burn intensified, then sputtered, coughing, a burst of red exploding out her mouth. Some splattered on Parkinson and she recoiled, glancing down at the sudden damp spots on her arm.

"Merlin, Potter, you're disgust—." Her voice cut off as her eyes widened. Pansy shrieked.

Harriet's fingers scrabbled at her throat in a bid to remove the obstruction. Nothing was there.

" _Harriet!_ "

On instinct, she went to rise and only managed to throw herself backward, not registering the hard thwap of her skull smacking the floor in her desperation to breathe. Black spots bubbled to life. _I can't breathe! I can't—!_ Someone had hold of her arm. Hermione screamed, " _Professor Dumbledore!_ " and Harriet's vision tunneled until everything seemed to simply drift away.

Then, she knew no more.


	32. hand to the heart

**_xxxii. hand to the heart_**

Severus was having a wretched evening.

The day itself had been wretched from the outset, the first class a double period with the first year Slytherin and Gryffindor sods, two full hours spent attempting to squeeze information into their vacuous little skulls while he toadied to Death Eater brats and sneered at Minerva's charges. Longbottom spent much of the lecture silently scoffing at everything Severus said before he and Finnigan proceeded with their abysmal work in the practical. Malfoy's sprog almost laughed himself sick when the Boy Who Lived melted yet another bloody cauldron.

Potter and her cohorts required little attention; indeed, the three girls sat clumped in the back and only Granger dared ask questions during the lecture. As long as he allowed Black to partner with the other two, her catastrophes were limited. They formed a veritable paragon of social awkwardness and floated about the edges of Slytherin House, escaping pure-blood posturing and dissenting politics with an ease only children were capable of. It kept interested eyes away from Potter, kept her safe. Being able to somewhat ignore the girl as a result proved relieving for Severus.

He picked at his cold dinner, ignoring Minerva's little irritated sniffs of disapproval. Gryffindor lost a grand total of forty-five points in Longbottom's class alone and he knew the miffed Scotswoman would be banging on his office door later that evening, demanding an explanation. Slytherin would probably come slinking by for the show, foul creep. He felt the impending headache already lurching in his skull like a dark and foreboding promise.

Severus reached for his goblet—and swallowed a scream when agony tore through his hand.

Lucky for him, no one noticed; at that moment, a shriek filled the hall and several bodies at the Slytherin table leapt to their feet. As pain savaged Severus' arm, Harriet Potter toppled from her seat between Granger and Black, spewing blood.

Severus couldn't breathe. _It's the Vow_ , he realized. In that instance of time, seemingly suspended for an eternity, the world moved in slow, languorous increments around him as he cradled his burning wrist. _It's the FUCKING VOW!_

"Professor Dumbledore!" Granger cried. The Headmaster was already descending the dais with Minerva in tow, students scattering before them like sparrows watching a cat approach. Minerva may coddle her Gryffindors, but not even the Potions Master could construe that fondness as neglect for any child of the other houses.

"Severus! Quickly!"

Albus' voice shattered time's suspension and Severus moved with ungainly speed, throwing himself over the table and down the dais steps with little more than a lunge. His vision wavered. With every passing second, the agony spread like a curse, pulsing with his heartbeat past his elbow, his shoulder, reaching for his chest and the vulnerable muscle racing inside its cage of bones. It almost appeared as if the shadows themselves rose from the floor to thrust the puling onlookers aside as Severus slid to his knees at the girl's side, but he couldn't be certain; his left eye strained and the right could see little more than blurs.

 _The Vow, the Vow, the Vow_ —.

He had a bezoar in his breast pocket, a habit he had picked up years ago in the wake of Slytherin's nasty little curse as he didn't trust the wretch or bloody Selwyn not to poison him for amusement. Severus wrenched the lumpy little stone out and had to almost break the girl's jaw in his effort to pry it open. She convulsed even as he shoved the bezoar down her throat, her teeth cutting his fingers, not that he could feel the biting beyond the Vow's unmitigated fury.

 _If she dies, I'll die as well._ A hysterical part of his beleaguered mind put in, _What an embarrassing way to pop off, keeling over at the side of a student like a geriatric having a heart attack_.

Granger, kneeling next to the girl, held Potter's arm down and sobbed. Black stood behind her, fists clenched tight and her face pale as a unicorn's hide. The tightness in Severus' chest began to subside as the girl's convulsions eased, though her breathing remained thin and several blood vessels in her eyes had burst. The Potions Master drew his fingers from her mouth and hissed at the sting. "She must be taken to the infirmary."

Pomfrey shoved her way through the gawking brats and conjured a stretched, which Severus and Minerva helped load the girl onto. "I will go with her," McGonagall said as Albus ordered the Head Boy and Girl to help the prefects disperse the crowd back to their dormitories. Naturally, Granger and Black resisted Farley's efforts to escort them away and remained behind. The other professors trailed their charges.

" _I'm_ her Head of House," Slytherin sneered. "You needn't bother, Minerva."

Minerva narrowed her eyes but didn't argue. She also followed Pomfrey and Slytherin out of the Hall as the former levitated the stretcher and the latter curled his lip. Severus didn't know why Slytherin bothered; the wizard professed no interest in his students beyond those malleable to the Dark Arts and had no patience for sick children. _What is his game now?_

His hand and wrist continued to throb as if both had suffered a sudden collision with something hard and unyielding. Severus sat back on his haunches and stared at his bitten fingers, blood oozing from the torn incisions, the flesh marbled with ripening bruises. Below that, he could barely see the pearlescent scarring of the old Vow.

 _I knew the truth all along, didn't I, Lily? I knew it was the Vow but didn't want to admit what it would mean._

He thought of all the times his hand had ached and pained him, of the weeks it would echo with distant prickling, of the nights he would wake in a cold sweat, searching for the blade piercing his skin only to find none. The pain had abated upon the girl's admittance in Hogwarts; the worst incidents had been in the Headmaster's office over the summer, and when the troll went on its rampage. _The letter_ , he realized. _We were discussing Potter's reply to the letter when I was in the office. What happened to her then?_

Despite its rather transparent name, the "Unbreakable Vow" was a gray and vacuous area of magic; those who studied it often died, infringing upon invisible terms and stray addenda, taken by a deadly curse masquerading as a promise because one cannot qualify what an oath means from one person to the next. Those dunderheads who had any _real_ understanding of the Vow would never undertake it, and in the extreme hypothetical that they _did_ , they knew only to agree to three stringent promises, three concise goals ingrained with expirations or loopholes that allowed for their survival. One did _not_ promise something as wretchedly vague as "protecting" someone else.

 _Will you protect my daughter, the person I love most in this world, if I cannot, Severus Snape?_

The Vow surged with agony, with warning, whenever he came close to failing her, like a tightrope frazzling under his feet. Swearing to protect a girl marked by the bloody Dark Lord may've been a stupid choice, and it may've been cruel of Lily to ask it of him—but Severus would've rather, quite literally, died than be shut out of his best friend's life for a second time. Against the cold reality of lost absolution, pledging himself to the girl that had become Lily's whole world was a little thing.

Movement jerked Severus' attention to the handkerchief Dumbledore proffered, the older wizard's eyes trained on his. Severus took the cloth and wrapped it around his injured digits.

 _I'm going to fucking kill Petunia_.

"Miss Granger," the Headmaster said in a soft voice to the girl still kneeling on the floor by the blood-splotched stones. He offered his hand and, once she took it, he helped Granger take a seat on the crooked bench behind her. The girl's face was mottled and her hair a mess of frazzled curls. "Can you tell us what happened?"

"I—I don't know, sir," she replied, stealing a fortifying breath to still her tears. "We were talking about—." Her eyes flicked toward the open doors, then away. "About _things,_ and Elara noticed Harriet's face had gone a bit funny. She started coughing, and there—there was _blood_ , and she knocked over—." Granger stopped and her eyes opened wide. The girl whipped herself around and stared at the blood splattered table littered with dinner's remnants. "The tea!"

"Tea, Miss Granger?"

She pointed out the offending cup, tipped over in its saucer, most of the brown liquid splashed onto the floor or Potter's abandoned plate. "The cup there! It wasn't here when we sat down. I'm sure of it! Harriet drank from it and right after—!"

"Thank you, my dear…."

Severus swiped the cup from the table and gave the rim a delicate sniff. He heard Albus gently encouraging the two first years to return to their dorm, though Severus himself paid them little mind. He inspected the liquid, then dipped his little finger into the dregs and tapped the tip against his tongue. The burning, acrid taste confirmed his suspicions.

Soon only Dumbledore and Severus remained in the Great Hall, the solitude punctuated by the heavy thud of the hall doors coming closed. "Our poisoner has a sense of irony," he spat, taking up a stray water goblet to clean his mouth. "They used an extract of Salazar's Tongue." A plant found common enough in the Forbidden Forest, though the average student wouldn't know how to take the snake-like petals and brew them properly for a working poison.

"Hmm. It wouldn't be my first choice for a poison." The Headmaster stroked his beard in thought, then said, "Loppy."

A loud crack heralded the arrival of a miserable, floppy-eared house-elf wringing the edge of his tea towel. "The Headmaster Dumblydore is needing Loppy?"

"Yes, thank you, Loppy. Could you bring us the elf responsible for supplying this cup of tea?" Dumbledore pointed out the cup in question and the elf's blue eyes followed.

"Yes, Headmaster, sir. Right away!"

The house-elf disappeared. Severus sneered at the spot where it had stood, more out of frustration for himself than anything else. _Poison. She was poisoned no more than a few meters away from you._ Albus sat on the edge of the Ravenclaw table's bench and held his single hand in a fist, the knuckles white. He was angry, Severus knew, but also worried; the skin about his eyes tightened, his white brow low and furrowed as the Headmaster's brilliant mind set to work.

"You know," the Potions Master said into the quiet, his voice cold. "I find your concern for Potter…surprising."

"Why is that, Severus?"

"Because of her _House_." Pacing the aisle between tables, Severus hid his trembling hand in the folds of his robes and rounded on Dumbledore. "I assumed you would be disappointed in her—suspicious, even. You've shown your precious Gryffindors considerable favoritism in the past, Headmaster. I am simply curious as to why you haven't written Potter off as a _lost cause_."

"Ah, my boy." Albus heaved a weary sigh and his beard twitched in what could have been an indulgent smile. "You of all people know I've made many mistakes, especially in regards to your own person while you attended this very school. I allowed a schoolboy rivalry to progress into hostility on both sides."

Severus looked away. "This is _not_ about me."

"No, of course not, my apologies. I simply mean to tell you that even men of my age are capable of changing and learning from their missteps. I have learned to not allow Tom Riddle's corruption of Slytherin color my perception of its children; I have, after all, been shown that some of the purest hearts come from the House of Serpents."

The Headmaster's knowing gaze caused Severus to scoff. _Pure-hearted indeed._

"There is good in Slytherin still. I will not give up on it. Harriet is kind—withdrawn yes, but kind and well-meaning, as are her friends Miss Granger and Miss Black. Miss Granger's time with the Malfoys seems to have tempered her resolve and ambition, while Miss Black appears determined not to repeat her father's mistakes," Albus continued. "Aside from that, I find a poisoning always warrants the Headmaster's concern. Don't you, Severus?"

The Potions Master said nothing.

Loppy reappeared a moment later with a second house-elf in tow. The latter creature swayed where it stood, eyes hooded as if dazed, and when Loppy let go of its arm, the elf fell to the floor.

Severus shared a look with the Headmaster. _It's been Imperiused._ Not well, either. The caster had left the spell to recede on its own without contingency, rendering the elf more of an insentient fool than usual as its personal will fought the expiring will of its attacker.

"This is Rikkety, Headmaster, sir," Loppy said, dragging the other elf back to its feet.

"Thank you, Loppy, that will be all."

The elf vanished again with a final worried glance about the Hall, and Dumbledore reached out to hold Rikkety steady as the cursed elf teetered. "Severus, if you would—?"

Nodding, he retrieved his wand and flicked it between the creature's dazed eyes. " _Finite Incantatem_."

The elf stumbled as the Imperious broke. A quiver ran through its spindly limb—then it burst into tears.

 _Wonderful_ , Severus griped as the green-skinned creature wailed. Dumbledore gave it several reassuring pats to the head and back before it calmed, snot dripping from its skinny nose, its tea towel wet with miserable tears.

"Oh, Headmaster Dumblydore, sir," it said in a high-pitched voice. _Female, then_. "Rikkety is being a bad elf, sir!"'

"Can you tell us what happened, Rikkety?"

The elf nodded, head bouncing as she sniffled and fresh tears threatened. "Rikkety was told to serve the bad tea to Harriet Potter, sir. Rikkety didn't _want_ to, Headmaster Dumblydore, but Rikkety couldn't stop herself!"

Albus conjured a handkerchief. He handed it to the elf, and she used to blow her nose. Tears peppered the ground underneath her.

"All is well, Rikkety. You were placed under a particularly powerful curse. Did you see who cast it upon you?"

As Severus expected, the elf shook her head. "No, Headmaster Dumblydore. Rikkety was cleaning up after Peevesy in the sixth floor corridor when someone came up the stairs and told Rikkety to go to the kitchens and make the bad tea."

Severus and Albus shared another look. The Imperius Curse necessitated a certain level of power and knowledge to perform with any proficiency, but any student sixth year and above had knowledge of the spell as per the curriculum, and a particularly studious fifth or fourth year could figure it out. Their suspect had thinned, but not by much.

Albus sighed. "Thank you, Rikkety. I would ask you to warn the elves to be cautious over the coming weeks and to alert me if they witness anything suspicious."

"Yes, sir, Headmaster Dumblydore," the elf said. She paused and wrung the damp cloth tea towel between her knobbly hands. "Is—is Miss Harriet Potter going to be all right? Oh, Rikkety is a bad elf, very bad…."

"She will be fine with a bit of rest, never you worry. Off you go now."

Rikkety sniffled again before disappearing. Severus stared at the far wall and fought his revulsion, his frustration. "Why," he said to Dumbledore. "Would the agent go after Potter and not Longbottom? The stupid boy ate and drank plenty tonight, to no ill-effect. Why not curse the elf to taint both of their beverages? We would have only had time to save one." _And I would have gone for the girl, if only to save my own hide_.

"The limits of the curse, I suppose," the Headmaster replied, voice weary. He lifted his wand and banished the evening meal's remnants.

"That still begs the question of why _Potter_ and not _the Boy Who Lived_."

Albus said nothing. They both knew the answer already.

"The agent is closer to the Dark Lord than we suspected," Severus said, dread pulsing in his chest like a living thing, coupling with the fading agony in his arm. "If they know Potter is not all she seems—if _he_ remembers something about that night—. Using Longbottom as a red herring will be pointless."

"Not pointless, Severus. Tom does not know the truth. I am assured of this."

" _How_?" the Potions Master snarled. "How can you be so sure of this when the girl almost choked to death on her own blood not ten meters from us?!"

The Headmaster raised his hand and Severus calmed himself, forcing one breath, and then another, into his chest. "I believe Voldemort—." Snape flinched. "—ordered his agent to test the waters, as it were. Had he known who Harriet is, he wouldn't have bothered with Neville."

"Unless attacking Longbottom was a rouse."

"I don't believe he has the patience for that, not in his current situation. Had he knowledge of Harriet and not just suspicions, or an old grudge, he would have gone for her directly."

"You underestimate him."

"No." Albus shook his head. "I know what Voldemort is capable of—what he, Slytherin, and Gaunt are capable of. In any iteration, Tom is not a man to suffer fools lightly, but what is left of his true self _will_ be desperate, Severus. We must be cautious."

The Potions Master stared at the Dumbledore's empty sleeve and the dread in his heart refused to abate, curling and snapping, tearing at his flesh until he felt he might bleed inwardly. _Cautious_. Severus no longer knew how to live any other way. "As you say, Headmaster."

"Excellent. You should go to the infirmary and check if Poppy needs anything. I will check the third floor corridor."

They departed, and as Severus walked the empty corridors, night clinging to the stone casements, his cloak trailing on the floor like a personal shadow nipping at his heels, he prayed the Headmaster was right.


	33. dark lord's mistake

**_xxxiii. dark lord's mistake_**

Harriet didn't wake all at once. Rather, she became aware of an annoying ache in her back, and even as she tried to ignore it, the ache grew and grew until it persisted from the bottom of her ankles to the top of her head. Groggy and uncooperative, Harriet pushed the feeling aside and attempted to let sleep take her again, but the longer she lay in the half-doze between dreams and reality, the more Harriet began to realize something was not quite right.

She was used to things being "not quite right"; the whole of her existence up until she stepped onto the Hogwarts Express could be considered just that—and yet this was a kind of not quite right Harriet hadn't experienced before, or at least not for a while. The only time she could recall something similar happening was when she woke in her cupboard, Set prodding her in the side, a large bump on her head after Uncle Vernon threw her inside.

 _What…what happened? What am I doing?_

Harriet opened her eyes and expected to see the top of her dormitory ceiling, fingers of moonlight rippling through the lake's clear waters—but that was not what she saw.

 _Where am I?!_

She sat up and the white sheet pulled up to her chin fell into her lap, pain throbbing anew in her back and about her stomach. Harriet plucked at the front of the unfamiliar nightdress, then pushed a hand against her middle. The pressure increased the ache and she groaned.

"Good evening, Harriet."

Harriet almost toppled right out of the narrow little bed she inhabited when a voice spoke at her side. She peered through the fuzzy darkness, trying to make sense of the misshapen blobs, and started again when someone slid her glasses into her hands. Muttering her thanks, she put them on and blinked.

The room she lay in was very large—a _ward_ Hermione would call it—with more than a dozen empty beds lined up along both walls, the sconces all doused for the evening, rendering thick shadows where the moonlight couldn't touch. Harriet's bed sat near the far wall inlaid with diamond-paned windows, a screen blocking off much of her view of the ward, and perched in a chintz armchair at her side was Headmaster Dumbledore. He smiled at her.

She blinked again. "Er—?" Harriet blurted, nose scrunched in confusion. "Wh—? Where—?"

"Eloquent, Potter."

The bespectacled girl was in for another shock when what she'd assumed to be a shadow by the windows bloody _moved_ , and the starlight glowed on Professor Snape's pale face when he turned in her direction.

Harriet stared at the gaunt wizard as she swayed ever so slightly, still mussy with sleep and cranky from pain. He stared in return. "I don't know what happened," she said. "But you can't give me detention for it."

His answering smirk said, _I can try_.

"I think we can do without any detentions tonight," the Headmaster said, raising his brow for Snape's benefit. The Potions Master huffed and crossed his arms, moving his attention to the view outside once more, which meant he missed the sudden humor in Dumbledore's bright eyes. "Can you remember anything that happened, my dear?"

Harriet mulled over her jumbled thoughts and flashes returned to her, voices and screams, hot pain in her mouth and throat, Hermione's clammy hand on her arm. "I…I drank something. Some tea I think, sir. It hurt."

Dumbledore nodded, his expression once more grave as he ran his thumb along his knuckles in what Harriet thought might be an anxious gesture. "Yes. You were poisoned, Harriet."

" _Poisoned_?"

She remembered blood on Parkinson, red drops peppering her own hands and her plate, the strange burning not abating even as liquid poured out of her mouth.

"Is—did anyone else get poisoned?" She had sat between Elara and Hermione like she always did in the Great Hall; were they hurt too?!

"Everyone else is fine, my girl—as are you, thanks to Professor Snape's swift actions and Madam Pomfrey's care."

Like a punctured balloon, Harriet deflated with relief, a heavy sigh leaving her as she slumped. _Snape saved me?_ "But how did it get into my tea, sir?" Harriet asked. She looked into Dumbledore's patient, knowing face, and when the silence stretched between them, she got her answer. "Someone put it in there? Someone meant to—?"

 _Someone meant to kill me_.

Harriet couldn't fathom why anyone would want to kill her; not even Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia could muster the kind of hate necessary for murdering their niece, though her uncle came close the last time she saw him. Harriet was a _nobody;_ an eleven-year-old orphan, an average student, and a girl who mostly minded her own business. " _Why_? I haven't done anything!"

Dumbledore considered her for a long moment. Snape, still at the window, said nothing and didn't appear to even breathe, holding himself like a gargoyle looking out over the battlements. Harriet could see his arms folded behind his back and his clenched fists were plain against the black fabric of his robes.

"Tell me, Harriet; what do you know of Lord Voldemort?"

"That's You-Know-Who, right?" It had taken months for Harriet to discover his stupid name. The Wizarding world refused to say it and Slytherins gasped when she asked. Even Hermione hadn't known; it was only through Elara, who read the name written in a journal, that they discovered the truth. "Why won't anyone say his name?"

"He put a Taboo upon it during the war. That is a kind of curse placed upon words—very old and very powerful magic, my dear. Voldemort felt it increased his mystique when others feared uttering his very name, but I feel fear of a name is a very silly notion. By naming a thing, we take away its anonymity and dispel the fear of uncertainty."

" _Don't_ tell her that."

Snape whipped around, his face livid. "With all due respect, Headmaster, the girl is a _Slytherin_. You, in contrast, are eminently powerful—and independent—wizard who doesn't have to worry about others taking offense to what he says. _She_ cannot go about naming the bloody Dark Lord. _Discretion_ is a virtue of the highest importance in our House."

"Perhaps you are right, Severus. However, it is up to Harriet to make that decision for herself."

Given the look Snape leveled in her direction, Harriet was fairly certain she'd land herself about a dozen detentions if she said "Voldemort" anywhere in his hearing.

"Nevertheless, his name and its usage are not what I wished to discuss; Harriet, what do you know of your history with Voldemort?"

 _History_? "He killed my mum and dad, right?" Harriet lowered her eyes, and instead of looking toward the Headmaster, she stared at the hem of Snape's black cloak. It trembled ever so slightly. "Before he tried to kill Neville Longbottom."

"Yes. He killed many, many people, your mother Lily being the last."

The same anger Harriet had experienced in Diagon Alley when reading _The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts_ came upon her again, and it curled in her belly like a living thing, wanting to lash out at someone, anyone, as she hated Longbottom for surviving, her own parents for dying, and Voldemort for being a monster. It wasn't fair—but Harriet couldn't change any of it. She forced the feeling away and shut her eyes.

"Voldemort is many things, Harriet; powerful, dangerous—and also cowardly, petty. He is a wizard who has committed as many mistakes as he has misdeeds, though he refers to the latter as his successes and would never acknowledge the former. If given the chance, he tries to rectify those mistakes—erase them, I should say, so they cannot remind him of his failures."

Harriet listened to the Headmaster and flinched each time he referred to the Dark Lord in the present tense. You-Know-Who was gone. He died at the Longbottoms'…hadn't he?

"Sir," she said, speaking softly, hesitating before meeting his eyes. "Sir, is—he's dead, right? You-Know-Who died that night. Neville defeated him."

Snape scoffed. Dumbledore's gaze flicked in his direction, a warning in his slanted brow, and the Headmaster shook his head. "No, I'm afraid not, my dear."

The blood roared in Harriet's ears as she gaped without a word at the Headmaster's statement, so simply given, his face open and calm even as Harriet's heart bludgeoned itself against her ribs. _I'm afraid not, my dear_. How could he not be dead? How could—? He killed so many, ruined so many families and reduced whole Muggle villages to ashes, had murdered her mum and dad and—. How could Dumbledore say he _wasn't_ dead?

Harriet trembled. The Headmaster took her hand in his, squeezing, and only then did she realize how very clammy it'd become.

"You are one of his mistakes, Harriet," the elderly wizard said. "Greater than you know."

"Why? Because he missed me in the house that night?!" Her voice went high and tremulous. "He's going to try to kill me?"

"Headmaster…" Snape cautioned.

Dumbledore ignored him and answered her. "Yes."

Harriet felt very much like she might lean over the bed's edge and vomit on the wizard's shoes. Sweat peppered her brow and her mouth dried, her tongue heavy and awkward behind her teeth, Harriet's fingers buzzing with numbness and fatigue. Someone had tried to poison her. Someone had tried to kill her for the Dark Lord.

"He's not…he's not _here_ , is he?" Harriet asked, though surely that couldn't be right. _Someone_ would have recognized one of the most dangerous wizards in history trotting about the corridors, wouldn't they?

"We believe he's had an agent infiltrate the school—either willingly or unwillingly, as there are curses that exist to bend a person's will against their own. You see, Harriet, Voldemort is not alive in the sense that you think he is; he's a shadow of his former self, unable to live but unable to die, and he will use any means he can to return himself to our plane and wreak havoc again on society."

" _Dumbledore_ ," the Potions Master snapped, stepping forward. "I really must protest—."

"Harriet has a right to know," the Headmaster responded with a shrug, his eyeglasses flashing in the moonlight. "Voldemort ensured her involvement when he ordered an attempt against her life."

"But why send someone to Hogwarts?" Harriet asked, gulping. "Surely not because of me. Is it because Longbottom's here?"

"No. He's searching for something, something he knows was moved from Gringotts and placed here within my safekeeping. I do flatter myself in thinking I'm rather clever sometimes, and this artifact—."

" _Headmaster!_ "

Before Snape could be reprimanded for interrupting again, the sound of the infirmary door popping open and muffled voices moving closer silenced the Headmaster and the dour Potions Master. They both turned their alert gazes toward the screen blocking view of the ward—and Harriet froze in her bed, jerking her hand from Professor Dumbledore's so she could twist it into the sheets. What if it was the poisoner coming to try again? Surely she'd be fine with two professors sitting right there—but what if she wasn't?

Harriet almost wept with relief when Hermione and Elara stepped by the screen and both yelped when they caught sight of Snape swooping over them.

"Thirty points from Slytherin," he said without preamble. "Out after curfew, the _nerve_ —."

"Sir, we were coming back from Astronomy and wanted to see if Harriet was well!" Hermione quipped before realizing to whom she spoke, slapping a hand over her mouth in afterthought. Elara just eased herself from foot to foot, looking queasy, if determined.

"I think, Severus," the Headmaster said as he rose from his armchair. It vanished with a quick flick of his hand. "We shouldn't fault Miss Granger and Miss Black for getting lost after their lesson. The castle can be a confusing place after nightfall, can't it?"

Both Slytherins nodded.

"Let's see…I believe thirty-five points should go to Slytherin for checking on the welfare of a classmate," Dumbledore pronounced, smiling, though Snape curled a lip and his hands clenched the footboard on Harriet's bed. Hermione beamed and Elara's cheeks flushed. "Though Professor Snape is correct, and it is quite late. If you'll excuse me, I have much to see to before I can seek my own bed. I will have to write to your relatives, Harriet, about this—."

 _What?!_ "No!" Harriet shouted, shocking those gathered around her, the Headmaster's brow rising and Hermione choking like she'd just cursed at the Queen of England. "I mean—you don't have to, I—err—I'll write to the Dursleys, I mean my aunt. I want to write to my aunt and uncle and tell them myself. Sir."

For one long, dreadful moment, Dumbledore seemed on the verge of denying Harriet's wish, then reconsidered, tugging at the end of his beard as he hummed. "Well, I'm sure it will comfort them to hear from you personally. I'll ask Madam Pomfrey to give you what you need for a letter in the morning."

"Thank you, Professor Dumbledore."

The Headmaster nodded, then left the ward. Harriet thought—hoped—Snape might go as well, but the thoroughly irritable wizard lingered at her bedside, plucking a vial from the nightstand and all but shoving it into her face. "Take this."

"What is it?"

Snape didn't say anything at first, but when it became clear Harriet wasn't about to take anything someone just handed her at random, he rolled his eyes and pinched the bridge of his considerable nose. "Incomprehensible little twit. _Take_ it. The poison used, Salazar's Tongue, _Lingua Salazarius_ , has lasting effects the Amino Accelerator counteracts by rebuilding liquefied tissue."

Harriet sighed. _He could rattle off a line of absolute nonsense and I'd have no clue what any of it meant or if it was true_. She took the potion and drank, wincing at the coarse, slimy texture. Snape snatched the empty vial back.

"It was laced with an analgesic melatonin infusion. You two—." He glared at Hermione and Elara. "—have five minutes before she's asleep. If you are not out in the corridor, where I will be waiting to escort you back to the Slytherin common room, after those five minutes, I will begin handing out detentions. _Don't_ try my patience."

With that said, Snape followed Dumbledore's path out of the infirmary, his cloak flaring like a particularly ominous thundercloud in his passage. He disappeared—and both of Harriet's worried friends threw themselves at her bed, wrapping their arms tight around the scrawny bespectacled girl.

"You're crushing me, really—."

"Don't you _ever_ do that again!" Hermione whispered in a furious undertone. She and Elara released Harriet, the latter coming around the other side of the bed to avoid Hermione's agitated hair flipping. "You could have _died_! Haven't you been told not to accept food or drinks if you don't know where they come from?!"

"To be honest, Hermione, I don't know where any of the food or drink on the House tables comes from."

"You know what I mean!" She sniffled and wiped at her misty eyes. Harriet stared, dumbfounded and not quite sure how to react; no one had ever been so worried over her wellbeing before. Had she walked out into the kitchen of Number Four one morning missing a limb, the Dursleys would have snapped at her to make certain she hadn't left any blood or bits of flesh on their clean floors. No one had ever cared about Harriet Potter.

Elara reminded Harriet of Snape when she looked to the other girl for help; the moonlight falling through the window blazed across her pale complexion, dark tendrils escaping the bun at the nape of her neck, gloves covering her anxious hands. She remained quiet as Hermione regained composure, then finally spoke. "…You're not going to write to your relatives, are you?"

Stricken, Harriet looked down at the blanket covering her knees. She shook her head.

The silence continued for much of their alloted five minutes, which surprised Harriet because she thought Elara would disapprove, or Hermione would argue. Instead, they stood quietly at her sides and each took one of Harriet's hands in their own. Harriet held onto them even after Snape's potion kicked in and she fell into her pillow once more, lost to her muddled dreams.

She was in the Great Hall, alone, seated at her familiar spot at the Slytherin table with nothing but a cup of tea before her. The cup of tea said, " _Drink me, Harriet,_ " and when Harriet refused, the cup repeated, " _Drink me, drink me, let me in_!" Harriet ignored the tea and stared instead at the ceiling above, watching the night sky bleed starlight until, one by one, the torches went out, and she drifted away.


	34. clever witches

**_xxxiv. clever witches_**

Harriet grimaced when she heard the familiar patter of Madam Pomfrey's approaching footsteps.

"Miss Potter," the mediwitch snapped when she stepped out of her office and found the girl attempting to escape the wing, one hand still on the knob, moments away from slipping through the opening. "I _told_ you—."

"But I'm perfectly well now!" Harriet argued, and the witch scowled, flicking her wand so the infirmary doors slipped right out of Harriet's hands and closed. "C'mon, Madam Pomfrey—!"

"As I said, Miss Potter, you may return to class tomorrow, but for the weekend you are to remain here." She pointed one imperious finger back into the ward's depths. "Bed."

Harriet returned the way she'd come, Madam Pomfrey quick on her heels, tucking Harriet in until the bespectacled girl felt all but strangled by the tight sheets. "Now _rest_. The more you rest, the quicker you can leave."

Harriet scrunched her nose at the witch's back when Madam Pomfrey finally returned to her office and quickly disentangled herself from the sheets, though Harriet did remain put. She was mostly sure the threats about Sticking Charms weren't real—but only mostly, and Harriet didn't much fancy being stuck anywhere while some nutter agent of the Dark Lord ran about the school wanting her dead.

An hour passed before Hermione and Elara arrived, both slinking by the ajar office door so Madam Pomfrey wouldn't shoo them away before they had a chance to visit. Harriet perked up at their entrance and grinned as her friends hurried over and slid the screen into place behind them, blocking view of the ward once more.

"Did you bring it?" Harriet asked, positively bouncing with eagerness as Hermione adjusted the satchel slung across her shoulder and searched the interior.

"Yes, of course I brought it, though I don't see why you want it so much…."

The bushy-haired girl unearthed Harriet's copy of _101 Legendary Artefacts of the Wizarding World_.

 _"_ Excellent!" Harriet crowed before checking the volume of her voice, glancing toward the screen. "Really, thank you, Hermione."

"It's fine," Hermione said, though a pleased blushed spread across her cheeks. "Oh! And Elara brought—."

The taller girl stuck a hand into the pocket of her robes and withdrew a coiled bit of green.

"Kevin!" Harriet said as Elara deposited the little snake into her waiting hands. Kevin was the Christmas cracker snake she'd stuffed into her pocket at the feast and had promptly forgotten, until she returned to the dorms and heard Livi hiss about an intruder. "Thanks, but why'd you bring him?"

"Livi's been going a bit…a bit mental," Hermione confessed, eying the snake with a healthy dose of caution. "We can't see him, of course, but he did tear Parkinson's bed to shreds and broke a mirror. I tried telling him you were fine—but, well, I don't speak snake, do I?"

"No," Harriet affirmed. "Though Livi understands some English when he feels like it."

"Elara came up with the idea of bringing you Kevin—such a ridiculous name, Harriet, really—so you could tell him what happened, and he could tell Livi."

Harriet lifted Kevin to her face. "I dunno if that'll work," she said, dubious. "Kevin's a bit of an idiot."

The snake blinked one eye, then the other, as his black tongue flickered.

"Really?" Hermione asked as she sank into the visitor's chair. Elara elected to perch on the end of the bed, and Harriet folded her legs to give her room. "That's fascinating. You know he's not a _real_ snake; he's a low-level Transfiguration golem created by the magic in the cracker you pulled. He's like the insects and animals we work with in Professor McGonagall's class."

Harriet blinked. "So—wait? Those animals aren't _real_?"

"They're real in the sense that they have flesh and synapses and comprehend basic stimuli. According to Professor McGonagall, however, they lack a certain indefinable spark of life. Did you know that's where the stories of Frankenstein came from? He was a wizard who attempted to bring a human golem to life. The creation of human golems is Dark magic, of course, though they are permitted in the training of Healers and mediwizards—and, anyway, Frankenstein thought to use dead bodies as his base because he felt it was the closest he could get to true living flesh, and that broaches into Necromancy, which is a forbidden branch of Transfiguration—."

Harriet and Elara nodded their heads at proper intervals while Hermione rattled off more magical history, until she paused for breath and realized she'd been rambling at some length. "Oh, I'm sorry, the thought got away from me. Anyway, Kevin's a golem. It's quite interesting that he's able to understand and perform commands."

"Yeah," Harriet replied. "I wonder if that's why Livi hates him, though. I had to ask him nicely not to eat Kevin and now Livi treats him like his own personal slave."

"Oh, Harriet, that's _awful_."

"Well, what would you have me do?" the bespectacled girl huffed. "Livius is almost as heavy as I am and I don't much fancy getting into an argument with a miffed Horned Serpent."

Hermione subsided with a cross expression and Elara smirked, turning before the older Slytherin could see. Harriet stroked a finger against Kevin's skull to get his attention.

" _Misstresss_ ," the little snake hissed, wriggling in her palm, looping skinny coils about her wrist.

" _Hullo, Kevin_ ," Harriet said. " _Can you bring a message to Livi?_ "

The snake swayed.

" _Tell Livi I am okay. Can you do that?_ "

The swaying paused, then Kevin responded, " _Kevin will_."

Harriet gave the snake a minute to process the information before testing him. " _Kevin will what?_ "

Kevin's beady little eyes widened as he stared at Harriet and whipped his forked tongue out. " _Kevin will…?_ " His coils tightened, voice puzzled. " _Kevin will…Kevin will bitesss._ "

Satisfied with his decision, he reared back and bit the finger that'd been stroking his head—the finger that was bigger around than the whole of the little snake's body.

Harriet pinched the bridge of her nose and sighed.

It took several more rounds of repetition and finger chomping before Harriet felt they had a semi-decent chance of Kevin relaying a proper message to Livi, and she handed the snake back to Elara, who slipped him into a pocket without so much as a flinch. They chatted quietly for a few minutes about the rumors swirling through the school and the general unease in Slytherin House after one of their own was poisoned. Harriet propped open _101 Legendary Artefacts_ in her lap and began flipping through pages.

"So why did you want the book?" Hermione asked as Harriet frowned at the picture of a green suit of armor. "I know you must be bored up here, but you were rather…insistent, and specific."

Harriet stopped her perusal and considered her two friends, Hermione and Elara considering her in return. Should she tell them what the Headmaster had said? What would they do? Harriet didn't want them to worry—or, worse, decide being around Harriet was too hazardous for their own health, which might very well be true if Harriet's would-be murderer felt less stingy with his poisons. She fiddled with the corner of a page.

"Professor Dumbledore…when he came Friday night, he told me that I was poisoned by an agent of the Dark Lord."

" _What_?!" Hermione gasped, clapping a hand over her mouth when the exclamation echoed. Both she and Elara paled considerably, torn between outright horror and incredulity. Harriet rushed to explain.

"I know, I know, I didn't really believe him at first, either. Professor Dumbledore said I was a mistake to—to _him_. That _he_ meant to kill me when I was a baby with my parents, and that he's not really dead like we think he is." Harriet picked at the book until the page's corner and she pressed her thumb against it, flustered. She didn't meet their eyes. "They don't know who the agent is, 'course, and I'm not the _reason_ they're here. According to the Headmaster, the Dark Lord wants something that Dumbledore has—an artifact, he said, that was in Gringotts before and then came here." _And I want to bloody well know what it is if I'm going to be murdered over it_.

"And did—did Professor Dumbledore say what this artifact was?"

"No. I think he was going to, but Snape looked like his head might explode if the Headmaster did." Harriet patted the book. "So I thought I might find something in here."

"But, Harriet, it could be _anything_."

"I know, but if it's something important enough that the bloody Dark Lord wants it so much, and it had to be moved from Gringotts of all places, then maybe it's in here."

Elara lifted and folded one leg at the knee so she could sit more on the bed and crane her neck to look at the book. Harriet was relieved neither she nor Hermione had gotten to their feet and ran from the room. "Rule out anything overly large," Elara muttered, pointing out a picture of Hebo's dragon-drawn chariot. "Anything ancient with old magic in it can't be shrunk, and usually can't be levitated. The goblins have week-long waiting periods to get over-sized objects in and out of Gringotts because of the mine shafts; it would not have been removed as quietly as it has been."

Harriet flipped ahead, nodding. "How 'bout any of these?" she asked as she pointed out a fancy array of different swords. "Excalibur. Galatine. Cla—cla—? The _Clam Sola_."

Hermione bounced out of her chair and came to Harriet's side. " _Claiomh Solais_ , Harriet. Not _Clam_."

"Well, however it's pronounced—what do you think? This says it glowed with the light of the sun and could cut enemies in half. Oh, bloody hell."

Hermione gave her swearing a half-hearted reprimand as she nibbled at her lower lip, deep in thought. "That…that wouldn't make sense. Oh, none of it makes sense at all! You-Know-Who is supposed to be dead! How could Headmaster Dumbledore—?" Hermione took a shuddering breath as she saw Elara's stern expression and Harriet's nervous flinching. "I'm sorry. No, not a sword. Most listed here are accounted for and are simply legendary for their ownership. Not very useful."

The next few pages held three items collectively entitled the _Deathly Hallows_. "I'd want these if I was a murderous Dark Lord," Harriet said as she stared at an illustration of a black rock, wand, and cape. "Listen to this; ' _it is said that he who brings Death's three Hallows together shall be his master, and confront that which terrifies mortal man_.'"

Hermione shook her head. "No. The Deathly Hallows are purely a legend. Witches and wizards have claimed to own the Elder Wand or the Cloak of Invisibility dozens of times over the centuries and are always proved wrong. Whatever You-Know-Who is after has to be _real_ , because the Headmaster says it was in Gringotts before." Suddenly, she blinked, her mouth popping open in silent shock. "The third-floor corridor on the right-hand side!"

Harriet knew about the corridor, of course; Professor Dumbledore had told them all at the start of school to avoid the place unless they wanted to die. It wasn't the kind of thing one forgets in a hurry. The Slytherins, being _Slytherins_ , avoided the place and generally only spoke about the corridor in theory if they spoke of it at all—while the Gryffindors gamely admitted they'd tried the door at least once, just wanting a peek, but couldn't get past the lock.

"That must be where he's put it," Hermione said, grinning from ear to ear. "Why else keep something potentially dangerous in a _school_?"

Elara, reading an line about Goswhit, Arthur's helmet, frowned and said, "He was overtly theatrical about that, don't you think?"

"What do you mean?"

"His speech regarding the corridor was blatant, given before the whole school. He didn't need to say anything, did he? He could've just kept the door locked and anyone who came across it would've been quietly turned away, as we've seen. Instead, he told _everyone_ about it. I would presume he also told this _agent_."

Hermione's eyes widened. "You don't think it's in there."

"If the Headmaster was a Slytherin, I would guarantee it wasn't."

They continued to theorize on the Headmaster's motivations while Harriet flipped further ahead in the book, moving past the Shield of El Cid, the Brisingamen, the Gem of Kukulkan, and settling on the image of a black cauldron oozing veins of green. "' _Pair Dadeni: Cauldron of Rebirth_ ,'" she read aloud, interrupting Hermione. "' _Those who possess the Cauldron are said to be able to pour life into the dead and revive them from their eternal rest'_." Harriet glanced up. "Professor Dumbledore said _he'd_ use any mean he could to 'return to our plane.' D'you think this is it?"

They debated the idea, then Hermione shook her head, decisive, hair bristling about her frustrated face. "No. The Pair Dadeni is real, unlike the Hallows, but it's been lost. See, right here it says; ' _The last owner Cadfan Blevins reported the Pair Dadeni missing from his Vaults in 1982._ '"

Elara scoffed. " _Reported_ missing, Hermione. The Blevins are a dodgy Welsh pure-blood family on the verge of selling their House rights. Cadfan was trying to pull what the Muggles call an _insurance scam_. Doesn't work well against the goblins, I'd gather."

"Why haven't _I_ heard about the Blevins family?"

"Because the Malfoys are narrow-minded. I doubt they want to teach you much about pure-bloods outside England or Scotland."

Harriet kept reading, pressing a knuckle between her teeth and biting down as she concentrated. _No_ , she thought. _Not the Cauldron. Looking at the pictures, it's much too big and probably weighs five or six stones. Professor Dumbledore said Voldemort is unable to live and unable to die; I don't think the Cauldron would help him_.

A flash of red on a new page caught Harriet's eye and she paused. "' _The Philosopher's Stone_ —.'" She had barely begun to read before Hermione snatched the book from her hands. "Steady on!"

Hermione's brown eyes flicked back and forth at dizzying speeds. "This!" she cried, Harriet and Elara hurrying to shush her. She continued at the same volume. "It has to be _this_. It fits!"

"Shh! Lower your voice!"

Hermione scoffed. "If she hasn't come to shoo us off by now, she's not going to. You _do_ know she has wards around the beds, right?"

Harriet opened her mouth to say that, no, she hadn't known that, when Elara asked, "What is the Philosopher's Stone?" and tried to read the book's print upside down. Hermione flipped the text around.

"' _The Philosopher's Stone exists as the pinnacle achievement in the field of alchemy, with only alchemist Nicholas Flamel noted as a successful creator of the legendary substance. The Stone can transform any metal into gold and is capable of creating the Elixir of Life, which grants its drinker health, immortality, and preserves them from infirmity.'_ "

The three girls shared a look over the book's colorful pages. "But why does it have to be _this_?" Harriet asked. "Why are you so certain?" Sure, the immorality and wealth seemed perfect, but Harriet thought the Cauldron would fit the needs of a man not wholly alive too if he really wanted it—or maybe one of those fancy swords that could cut enemies in half just by nicking them. _Ick_.

"Because," Hermione replied, smug as could be, a smile curling her lips. "The Ministry offers public records of Hogwarts' merits and standards, which includes the qualifications and references of the school's professors. I reviewed them over the summer because I wanted to know why Hogwarts was considered one of the best schools in the world. Did you know Professor Snape became Europe's youngest Potions Master and got references from _both_ Ebus Pippet and _the_ Libatius Borage? And Professor Flitwick used to be an international dueling champion—? But, anyway, I looked up the professors' qualifications, and then the Headmaster's."

"And?"

" _And_ Professor Dumbledore is eminently qualified for his positions as Headmaster and Supreme Mugwump of the ICW. He's widely recognized as an authority and genius in his fields of mastery, Transfiguration and alchemy—the latter of which he apprenticed for under—."

"Nicholas Flamel," Elara said as she caught the train of Hermione's thought. "He received his mastery from Nicholas Flamel, so it would be safe to assume they remained friends."

"And _who_ would you ask to guard your precious and valuable stone if not your good friend and master sorcerer, Albus Dumbledore?"

Suddenly, from behind the screen came the sound of slow, methodical clapping.

"Well, _well_ ," said a familiar voice, and Harriet's heart almost escaped her chest when Professor Slytherin stepped into view, sliding out from behind the screen with effortless grace and a haughty smirk in place. "Aren't you a trio of clever, _clever_ witches."

Both Elara and Hermione stood, only to sit once more when getting off the bed only brought them closer to the Defense professor. Slytherin's unnerving red eyes flicked between them, contemplating, until he settled on Harriet. "Dumbledore is a meddler," he said at length, flicking imaginary lint from his robe sleeve. "He is a meddler of the highest order, a wizard of passable talent who uses the skills of others to elevate his status and quite enjoys having Slytherins clean up the mess. I couldn't begin to fathom his reasons for wanting you to know of the Philosopher's Stone, but I will give you three some sound advice; clever little first years who stick their noses into the business of Dark Lords don't become clever little second years."

Harriet swallowed. She didn't know if he was threatening them with expulsion or—or something _worse_.

"Leave it be. Don't ask questions."

Hermione and Elara nodded, mumbling "Yes, Professor," but Harriet—perhaps emboldened by boredom or her very recent escape from death, briefly met the wizard's gaze. Prickling alighted from her shoulder and trailed across her collarbone, scraping at her chest and her throat. "We're Slytherins, sir," she said, swallowing again. "Not mad."

He seemed to find that funny because he laughed—and the sound hit Harriet like a bucket of ice water. _I've heard that laugh before._ High, cold, and utterly humorless, Professor Slytherin's cackling caused all three witches to shiver with unknowable dread.

"Quite right, Miss Potter. Thirty points to Slytherin."


	35. cross my heart

**_xxxv. cross my heart_**

Elara Black knew more about helplessness than most twelve-year-old girls.

She'd spent the majority of her life helpless, entrusted into the hands of men and women who followed their dogma with fanatical, closed-minded fervor and practiced their absolutions on the children they tended. She knew what it meant to be pinned, held down, by words and by steel, belittled by scripture and drunken slurring and childish fear. She could remember the smell of burning flesh in her nose when Father Phillips pressed the glowing brand into her chest yelling " _By Christ be purged!_ "—and still, Elara had never felt quite so helpless as she did when watching her best friend choke to death.

The feeling remained with her days after Madam Pomfrey discharged Harriet from the infirmary and they went about their classes, the short Slytherin more subdued than usual. From everything Elara had seen, Harriet wasn't a boisterous girl; she came across as rather brash sometimes, but Elara felt her attitude came from a lack of self-awareness rather than malice or rudeness. She'd seen similar behavior in the younger orphans at St. Giles' who used to live with neglectful families, families who left them on their own for long stretches of time. They jumped at raised voices and generally avoided eye contact, just like Harriet. Sometimes they had imaginary friends.

Elara wondered if that was why Harriet often whispered to herself. She was, without a doubt, an odd girl—but also one of the loveliest people Elara had ever met, and the idea that an agent of the half-dead Dark Lord—the Dark Lord her father supposedly served—had tried to kill Harriet sat heavy upon Elara's heart.

Harriet was quieter than usual, tired after her stint in the hospital wing. Elara had learned from Hermione that the poison used, Salazar's Tongue, melted the imbiber's insides, not quite like an acid would but with comparable results, and Harriet would need time to regain strength in her repaired muscles, bones, and organs. Her already sketchy control suffered, and Harriet managed to turn her mouse into a baby elephant during Transfiguration, breaking the desk and earning a flabbergasted tongue lashing from Professor McGonagall. Normally she took everything in stride and brushed off Parkinson's teasing, the sneering Slytherin always mocking Harriet's hair or her scar or her glasses, but for the last few days Harriet had only slumped beneath the relentless mocking. Parkinson kept pantomiming choking in the Great Hall and Harriet refused to touch any of the drinks.

So if Elara paid an upper year Slytherin to Charm Parkinson's pumpkin juice to shoot straight up her nose, she felt justified in that bit of petty bullying. Parkinson vomited all over a screaming Malfoy and although the sight almost made Elara sick herself, Hermione and Harriet—and most of Slytherin House—laughed so hard they nearly wet themselves.

Snape proved particularly unforgiving on Friday during double Potions. He skulked the dungeon's length, a terrifying specter right out of Father Phillip's biblical stories about pale, furious ghosts and devils, his footsteps silent but no less haunting in their intensity. "Black," he snapped as soon as they filed into the classroom. "Back row."

Elara sighed and moved her cauldron from Harriet and Hermione's table to the single one in the back. She fought the urge to mutter darkly under her breath, guessing it was going to be one of _those_ days, the ones in which Snape didn't allow Elara to skate by on Hermione and Harriet's efforts and instead made an absolute hash of things on her own. She let the legs of her cauldron touch down with a loud _bang_ and the Potions Master shot a glare in her direction before beginning the lecture.

She brooded through much of the lesson, ignoring Slytherins and the Gryffindors who still seemed to find it awfully amusing that a member of the House of Serpents got themselves poisoned and almost died. Elara had heard Longbottom mutter that Harriet "got what she deserved" on more than one occasion, though the sentiment lacked heat, laced with the same tepid energy the orphans used after witnessing one of the sisters' punishments, simply relieved it hadn't been them under the switch.

The first portion of class ended without event and they began their practicals. Snape prowled about, swooping over the Gryffindor side of the room to chastise Weasley on some contrived grievance. Malfoy took the opportunity to lean back in his seat and, within Harriet's hearing, said, "Oh, I do hope my dinner doesn't end up poisoned. Just imagine; I actually have _parents_ who'd mourn me."

Harriet shot Malfoy a two-fingered salute and Hermione smacked her arm down before Snape whipped around and paced back in their direction.

To Elara's surprise, she almost managed to finish her potion before the situation went pear-shaped. Her concentration wavered during the final maturation as she looked about the class and watched Snape's back when he passed Harriet's table and, for the briefest of moments, hesitated. _What if it was Snape?_ an insidious voice in Elara's head whispered. _Hermione still suspects he might have cursed Longbottom in November. What if all of this is a twisted scheme between him and Slytherin meant to endear or test our loyalties? What better way to divert attention than to place himself in situations where he appears the hero or savior?_

Her control slipped, and some organic ingredient within the brew began to decay or blossom, spoiling the whole potion. The liquid curdled and began to swiftly rise like dough, cresting the cauldron's top before Elara felt a sudden shove of magic hit her in the chest, throwing her into the counter at her back as the frothing meniscus collapsed and a wave of foul goo sloshed over the table and floor.

"How shocking," the Potions Master drawled from across the aisle, wand extended. He had been the one to push Elara back. For once Snape sounded bored and impatient rather than gleefully mocking. Apparently, there was more on his mind than lambasting Elara's substandard brewing skills. "Clean your mess, Black. No magic."

The 'mess,' as he'd stated, had begun to cool and congeal on the table and stones underfoot, sticking the abandoned stool fast to the floor. Elara retrieved the cleaning supplies typically reserved for detentions from the cupboard by the stone sink and dragged her feet back to her seat. _He could clean it up in an instant if he wanted. Git._

Class came to an end soon enough and the other students hurried to tidy their stations and tuck away their kits. Longbottom escaped a similar meltdown by a slim margin and scampered with Weasley and Finnigan quick on his heels, the trio shedding Billywig wings and nettles in their wake that had Snape cursing softly. Harriet and Hermione lingered, but Elara shook her head, hands covered in inert green goo, so the pair hefted their bags onto their shoulders and departed.

Snape's eyes followed Harriet from the dungeon. Even after she'd passed through the door, the man's gaze bore into the weathered wood as if trying to see through it, not yet ready for the girl to pass beyond his sight.

Elara didn't like the way Snape looked at Harriet. It wasn't predatory; Elara would've gone straight to Dumbledore if she'd thought so, consequences be damned. Rather, it was the way a person might look at a teacup sitting too close to the edge of the coffee table—or at a priceless Faberge egg in the hands of a drunk. Raw panic glinted behind Snape's black irises and it made Elara nervous, nervous because she hadn't a single idea _why_ the wizard looked at her best friend like that. What was there to be nervous about? What did he know that Elara didn't?

The last student left, the door swinging shut, and Elara dropped the dirty rag onto the table with a _thwap_. Snape glanced toward her—and found the girl regarding him with a narrow-eyed stared.

"Why do you look at her like that?" she asked, her tone questioning rather than impertinent. Elara hardly cared if she offended _Snape_ of all people—the great bat—but she _did_ want an answer.

"Excuse me?" he replied in a voice that conveyed an easy, chilling distaste.

"Why do you look at Harriet like that?" Elara repeated. Snape's eyes widened as if he hadn't actually expected her to say the words again. "I don't like it."

The Potions Master blinked, then gathered himself like a growing storm, anger blotching his pale face, hate glittering in his eyes like the hard shell backs of dead beetles. Time in the orphanage made Elara sensitive to an adult's shifting moods, and just as she knew Harriet made Snape nervous, Elara knew her presence sparked fury in the wizard. "I'd be _very_ careful about what you're insinuating, Black," Snape said in that soft, whispering voice of his. "Very, _very_ careful."

"I'm not insinuating anything," Elara replied. She refused to match his whispering and spoke clearly, loudly. "I'm asking a question I hope to have answered. _Sir_."

Snape stepped away from his desk and, when he approached, Elara tried very hard not to shudder. The man loomed like a silent, seething terror, and with his black robes relieved only by the slightest touch of white at the collar and his cuffs, the wizard looked _close_ enough to a priest for her heart to race with panic.

Elara swallowed as the Potions Master stared her down.

"You're awfully _bold,_ aren't you, Black? Perhaps you would have done better in Gryffindor…like your good-for-nothing father."

She flinched, face burning. _So that's it_ , Elara realized. _He knew Sirius. Or, at least he knows_ of _him. I wonder…._ "I'm not my father."

"For your sake, you'd better hope not."

Snape went to leave, dismissing her, and Elara spoke before she could stop herself. "If you hurt her, I'll see you sorry for it."

He froze. Elara fancied she could hear her heartbeat echoing against the dungeon's cold, grimy walls as the wizard slowly, _slowly_ turned to face her. "Are you hoping to be expelled, Black? I can accommodate that wish, but do make sure you're _very_ certain you want to be on the train back to London after supper before threatening _me_."

"It's not a threat," she said, feeling more than a touch queasy. "Only Gryffindors make threats, sir; Slytherins make promises."

"A _promise_ , girl?" Snape took another step forward and Elara couldn't help herself; she retreated and her back met the edge of the counter behind her. The professor sneered. "Pathetic. I don't know what game you're playing, child, but—."

"I'm not strong," she blurted out. Elara didn't know why she kept talking despite every manner she'd had drilled into her head screaming at her to be quiet. In her mind's eye, Harriet lay prone on the Great Hall's floor, suffocating, poisoned by an innocuous cup of evening tea, and who best to poison a girl than a wizard who worked with poisons every day? Elara never wanted to be helpless again. "I'm only twelve and I don't know much magic—but I do know the name of Black has clout, and I would use whatever clout I could against anyone who hurt Harriet or Hermione."

Snape leaned forward and Elara reciprocated by leaning back. She wrung her hands together and wondered what it'd be like to be back at Grimmauld Place full-time, if she'd be able to teach herself magic after being expelled, if that was allowed, or if they snapped your wand and—.

" _Only_ Miss Potter and Miss Granger, Black? Am I free to poison whoever else I wish outside your purview?"

The question threw Elara, who'd been preparing for another verbal onslaught maligning her character. "Ah," she said, biting her tongue. She remembered then something that Matron Fitzgerald once told her when Elara asked why _she_ was being punished after Wendy Pamilo, a daughter from one of the church parishioners, broke the fence in Elara's sight. "We take care of our own," Elara repeated in monotone. "And God manages all the rest."

The Potions Master scoffed, but he did lean away once more and Elara breathed easier. "Insufferable fool," he sneered. His glare softened, or so Elara imagined. The low, murky light of the dungeons made such things difficult to decipher. "Make no mistake, Black, you are _remarkably_ like your father; arrogant and presumptuous. He too made hollow promises to protect his _friends_ , promises that meant _nothing_ to him or to them in the end. Save your sanctimonious posturing for someone who actually means Potter harm."

Quick as a whip, he drew his wand and Elara flinched—only for him to brandish it at the mess on the table, vanishing the mucky cauldron and spilled glop with a single gesture. Snape smirked as he tucked his wand away again. "Get out of my sight."

Elara was all too pleased to oblige the man; she snatched hold of her bag and bolted from the classroom, earning a sharp rebuke for running and slamming the door. Even so, Snape didn't give her a detention, didn't take points, and though Elara wound up sick from nerves in the first-floor loo, she counted her confrontation as a win.

She wouldn't allow anyone to hurt her friends.


	36. silvered want

**_xxxvi. silvered want_**

If there was one thing Harriet couldn't stand, it was all the staring.

She didn't know how Longbottom could tolerate it, how he didn't start yelling at people to look the other bloody way when he walked down corridors, because Harriet felt sick to her stomach with the strange level of infamy she seemed to be experiencing. The whole of the school or at least the vast majority of it had been present for her poisoning, and they wanted to know why one small, twitchy little first year Slytherin kid almost kicked the bucket in the Great Hall. Hence the staring.

As May moved on, some of the staring tapered off, but Harriet still heard the whispering and it made her increasingly uncomfortable, so much so that she accidentally magicked one of the tapestries to tear itself off the wall and chase a particularly loud sixth year Hufflepuff through most of the school. Nobody could prove she'd done it, of course, but Harriet took that as a sign to keep to herself for a while.

The afternoon was warm—one of the warmest they'd had in quite some time, and Harriet couldn't bear the idea of grinding her nose in revisions for another minute, even if Hermione and Elara seemed perfectly content with studying until their eyeballs fell out. Harriet wasn't having it.

So, after promising she wouldn't wander off alone, Livi fast asleep and coiled about her torso, Harriet headed outside where other students congregated in the sunshine and borrowed one of the training brooms from Madam Hooch. The brooms didn't go very fast and only rose three feet off the grass, but Harriet enjoyed the weightless sensation, the pull of wind through her hair, and the quietness found while toddling about the grounds on a broom that could be outstripped by passing butterflies.

Harriet caught sight of a familiar form heading toward the Forest's edge and zoomed nearer.

"Hagrid!" she called out, hopping off the broom at the half-giant's side, setting off a small cloud of dust and dirt from the path.

"Hullo, Harriet!" he boomed, grinning, reaching out with his free hand to pat her shoulder—almost driving Harriet into the ground. In his other hand he held a suspiciously stained sack, and upon seeing where Harriet's attention had wandered, he shrugged. "Goin' to feed the Thestrals. Got a new foal who needs lots o' protein."

"Can I come?"

"'Course," Hagrid responded—then paused. "Err, well if you don't mind a bit o' blood, I should say. Thestrals love raw meat—can't get enough of the stuff. They're scavengers by nature and harmless."

"I don't mind."

Harriet followed Hagrid on her broom since his stride was exponentially longer than her own. Thin saplings surrounded the path, and though they'd entered the treeline, Hagrid mentioned they wouldn't be going into the forest proper.

"Nothing would hurt you in there, though, not with me around," Hagrid boasted, swelling with pride. "Lots o' misunderstood creatures, you see, but they demand respect and space, which is what I keep havin' to tell those Weasley twins—but those two never listen, and I have to keep chasin' them off for their own good…."

Hagrid went on at some length about Ron's rascally brothers, though he sounded fond rather than scornful, and soon they came upon a partial paddock in a clearing where Hagrid set the sack down.

"You like flyin'?" Hagrid asked as Harriet hopped off her broom again and found a seat on the rickety paddock fence. An older student might've landed flat on their face, but Harriet was light enough for the barrier to hold. Livi hissed in his sleep and tightened fractionally, causing Harriet to wiggle to loosen his hold around her middle.

"Yes!" she replied with a wide grin. "I wanna try out for the team next year, if my marks are good enough."

"Marks?"

"Yeah. Professor Snape said you have to have all E's to play on the House team!"

Hagrid gave her a funny look and mumbled something into his beard that sounded like "sneaky sod," then picked up the sack and entered the paddock. "Your dad used to play Quidditch back in his day."

"You mentioned that when we first met."

"Did I? Guess I'm fergettin' things in my old age." Hagrid chuckled. "Damn fine Chaser he was. James flew like he'd been born on a broomstick. I think he won every game he played for Gryffindor. Gave me a shock seein' you flying about. You look just like James at a distance."

Hagrid opened the sack and drew out the bloodied haunch of what looked like a deer, or maybe a small cow. He strode a few paces from Harriet toward the trees, twigs and fallen branches snapping under his great boots, and seemed content to wait for whatever it was he was feeding to come to him.

Harriet tried—and failed—to picture her own father on a broom, playing Quidditch, wearing gold and red instead of silver and green. She wished she could've seen it for herself. Would James have taught her how to fly? Would he have gotten her a broom when she was little? Or would her mum have protested? What was Lily like? Did she play Quidditch too? Or did she watch Harriet's dad and cheer for him?

A sound shuffling nearer the clearing drew Harriet's attention to the paddock again. She blinked as she saw a black, skeletal horse coming over to the half-giant, fluttering its leathery wings and kicking its hooves in anticipation.

"Hey," Harriet said. "It's those spooky horses!"

Hagrid stumbled as if she'd assaulted him and the bloody leg in his large hand hit the dirt. The horse squawked in indignation but lowered its head to eat all the same, stripping bits of meat from the whole with its tapered beak.

"You c—? You can see 'em?" Hagrid choked as the face behind the beard paled drastically. Another horse came to investigate the commotion, seeming to slip right out of the sparse shadows accrued about the base of the wispier trees.

"Of course I can," Harriet said—then she recalled the time she'd tried to point them out to Hermione, and the other girl had given her a puzzled look, saying there was nothing there. "Is that, err, odd?"

Hagrid fumbled with the sack and drew out another leg—chicken, maybe—and proffered it to the new horse, who trotted over and happily accepted the food. "No, it's just—. They're terribly misunderstood creatures, Thestrals. People get scared of 'em, because you can—. Blimey, Harry. I'm probably not the best—. Well, you can only see 'em if you've…if you've seen someone pass on."

Harriet winced at the nickname before the meaning of Hagrid's words sank in. _If you've seen someone pass on_. "Oh," she replied, swallowing. She only knew two people who'd died, and while she knew she'd been in the house that night, she hadn't realized she'd been close enough to actually _see_ what'd happened. _Merlin,_ Harriet thought, morose. _No wonder I'm so weird._

"Would'cha like to feed 'em?"

He extended one of the plucked drumsticks to Harriet and, nodding slightly, she clamored off the fence and came nearer. The horses—Thestrals—watched her with curious attention, cocking their heads like birds, turning ever so slightly to keep her in sight. Harriet wrinkled her nose at the feel of lukewarm meat in her hand and Hagrid grinned, though his watery sniffle ruined the effect.

"Go on. Mind your fingers—they're harmless as lambs but can get a bit too excited. And remember to wash your hands real good after we're done…."

Two more Thestrals wandered out of the forest, plus the foal Hagrid had mentioned; long-limbed and clumsy, it would've knocked Harriet over in its rush if Hagrid hadn't caught her by the scruff of her neck. They were undoubtedly strange creatures, imposing and cool to the touch, and Harriet could see how carnivorous horses only visible to those who'd seen death might be scary to others—but the Thestrals proved as friendly as Hagrid said, and running her hands over their bony snouts reminded Harriet of petting Livi or other snakes.

As the Thestrals crowded around her and nosed her hair and licked her fingers clean, Harriet thought about her mum and dad and wondered, grimly, which of them she saw die as a toddler. How had she survived? Headmaster Dumbledore said she was a mistake, that Voldemort—the Dark Lord—had meant to kill her as well, but _how_ did she live while James and Lily died? They'd been a full-grown wizard and witch, and Harriet had just been a little baby. She didn't understand.

Harriet watched the scrawny foal lean against its mother as the mare pestered Hagrid for more scraps and she wished, more than anything, that she knew what having a family was like. All she had for comparison were the Dursleys, and they were no more her family than some rocks or the Thestrals themselves. She remembered Aunt Petunia would coo over Dudley and fix his hair and sometimes Harriet would do the same to herself, pretending she had a mum who cared about her scruffy haircut and ugly clothes, though the imitation never lived up to the real thing.

"Hagrid?" she asked, brushing one of the Thestral's scraggly manes. "If you could have anything at all, what would it be?"

"Eh?"

"What do you want more than anything else?"

"Hmm," he pondered, scratching at his wiry beard as he did so, leaving behind bloody scraps. Harriet would've pointed that out had the tallest Thestral not wandered over and plucked the pieces out himself. "Watch it there, silly beast. What was the question? What would I want more than anythin'? Not quite sure, really. Always wanted me a dragon, though." His tone turned wistful as he gathered the empty sack in one hand. "Fascinating creatures, dragons, but they don't live wild no more. They get into too many scrapes with the Muggles and the Ministry can't keep up."

Harriet's mouth quirked as Hagrid gushed about his favorite scaled creatures, and in the back of her mind, a familiar sly, cold voice spoke.

" _The Mirror of Erised is enchanted to show your most ardent desire, not the petty wants of everyday life. Many a wizard and witch have been fool enough to let the images depicted therein drive them to madness._ "

" _He will use any means he can to return himself to our plane_."

She gathered the broom and Hagrid led the way back to his hut, where he let Harriet wash her hands and served a spot of afternoon tea before they found places on the porch to sit and enjoy the spring weather. The May sun felt like heaven upon Harriet's upturned face, but a growing unease suffused her when she thought about that mirror in the Headmaster's office, and no matter how warm the weather grew, Harriet felt cold.


	37. look and see

**_xxxvii. look and see_**

Harriet stared at the gargoyle, and the gargoyle stared at Harriet.

She didn't know how long she'd been standing there, nor was she precisely sure of her reason for coming. To speak with the Headmaster, maybe? Whatever her motives, a sudden hankering for Muggle candy had Harriet drooling and so she told the gargoyle, "Fizzing Whizbees."

"No, no," said the gargoyle, its stone lips cracking and crumbling as it sneered. "No Fizzing Whizbees here. Only lemon sherbets!"

The gargoyle opened a taloned hand and, there, on its rigid palm, balanced a pile of sour yellow candies.

Harriet frowned. "But I don't want lemon sherbets."

The bright candies fell to the floor and disappeared in sooty puffs. "Then go through that door there."

Harriet whirled about, and behind her found the mentioned door, one she'd never seen before and knew couldn't possibly be across the corridor from the gargoyle. Still, she reached for the knob and stepped through.

A cool breeze whistled in the unyielding dark and Harriet's feet tamped down damp leaves, the Forbidden Forest stretching tall and foreboding all around her. She couldn't recall how she'd gotten here—hadn't she been in the castle speaking to the Headmaster's gargoyle a moment before? The night wood laid dark and unwelcoming in all directions, large shadows crawling in the bracken, sharp-toothed faces carved into the trees. Mirrors crowded the forest, mirrors of every shape and size, gilded or cracked, taller than houses, framed in the words ' _Nie mte l_ '. A single light flickered in the distance.

Harriet ran. The roots rose from the earth and coiled around her legs, but Harriet pushed through, kicking and writhing, until she reached a small cabin no bigger than a boot cupboard at the foot of a great oak. She threw open the door and slammed it shut behind herself. A torch lay on its side, flickering, batteries on the verge of going out.

Something heavy collided with the door at Harriet's back. She pressed against it, quivering, as fists pummeled the flimsy wood—then they stopped.

" _Harrrriet_ ," rasped a voice on the other side. " _Let me in, little Harriet_. _Just for a minute, let me in._ "

The torch flickered again, stronger than before, and Harriet silently begged for it not to go out. Nails scoured the door.

" _Let me IN!_ "

The torch died and Harriet lunged for it. "Please, please, _please_ —," she chanted as she beat the plastic tube against her hand and the batteries rattled. Finally, the light came on—and Harriet looked up into a pair of watching red eyes.

"—Harriet!"

She woke with a gasp, almost colliding with Hermione in her rush to sit up. The dream crowded her thoughts, then like a sugar cube in a cup of tea, broke apart and dissolved until only the taste remained—sour and acrid with bile and fear. The sensation of pins and needles crawled through her shoulder and neck. Swallowing, Harriet breathed hard and adjusted her glasses as she blinked and met Hermione's quizzical look.

"Are you okay?" the bushy-haired girl asked. "You napped right through lunch and I know you wanted a bit of a lie in, but I didn't want you to sleep through dinner as well."

Harriet yawned wide enough to crack her jaw and nodded, wiping gunk from her eyes. "I'm okay. Just had a bad dream." Which wasn't a rare occurrence, really. She studied the empty dormitory, brow furrowed, until she found Elara leaning against one of the carrells, a half-written letter abandoned on the desk alongside her quill. "Thanks for waking me."

Humming, Hermione sat on the edge of her own bed and fiddled with the curtains.

" _Ssss._ "

Livi shifted in the rumpled sheets, a somnolent hiss rising from the vicinity of Harriet's feet as she lifted the counterpane and peered at the snoozing serpent. An indolent blue eye opened and gleamed before Livi settled again. Harriet set about unraveling his coils and the snake dragged himself farther into the bed's covers. She was thankful she'd left Kevin in his makeshift terrarium in her trunk's nifty extension, since he had the unfortunate habit of sticking his snout in her nose while she slept.

"I'll never get used to that," Hermione said.

"Used to what?"

"Finding you in bed with a snake twice your size."

"He's not twice my size!" Harriet protested as she stroked a hand along Livi's back. "Livi's only—well, maybe a foot or so longer than I am tall."

"Isn't he going to keep growing?"

Harriet shrugged. "I read some of those books you showed me in the library and Magizoologists don't know much about Horned Serpents, really. They live for a long time apparently, and can take years to shed their skin, depending on ' _magical maturation_.'"

"Hmm."

Just then the door banged open and Pansy strode in, gifting all three of them with her haughty, scrunch-nosed sneer as she paused beyond the threshold and Harriet scrambled to make sure Livi was covered. The other witch didn't notice. "What are you three nerds doing in here?"

"We sleep in here, Parkinson," Elara drawled before Hermione could say anything. Pansy glanced at Elara and, meeting the taller witch's glare, decided to move on without comment, though she did scoff as she strutted over to the washroom.

"Reapplying her makeup. Again," Harriet muttered. Hermione disguised her laugh as a slight cough, which didn't do much to hide the sound. Apparently Pansy heard because she came back into the dorm and scowled.

"Don't you have something to study for, Granger?" One eye had a glob of mascara smudged in the corner and it stuck her lashes together in messy clumps.

"No? We just finished the last of our exams yesterday, if you can't recall."

"As if you'd let that stop you." Pansy stomped into the bathroom again.

Hermione glowered at the open doorway for a good minute before looking away, her cheeks stained a delicate shade of pink. "I don't know how she manages to make being studious and smart sound like an insult."

"Better yet," Elara said. "I don't know why she _thinks_ that's an insult."

Hermione didn't bother to cover her laugh this time, though if Pansy heard she chose to stay in the washroom. Harriet grinned—then pain lanced through her shoulder and neck, catching her unawares, and Harriet gasped, slapping a hand over the offending spot.

"Are you all right?"

"…Yeah." Harriet rubbed the shirt covering the old wound and popped open a button, pulling the collar down to inspect the irritation, though she couldn't quite manage. "My neck—my _scar_ —hurts."

"Your scar?"

"Mhm. I always guessed the cut hurt the muscles or the nerves or something, since sometimes it acts up. It's been a bit worse lately, though."

Hermione stood. She reached for Harriet's collar and, after pausing to receive permission, plucked the fabric aside. "It looks—well, it looks bad," she decided, lips pressed into a worried line. "The skin's gone puffy and inflamed. Have you been scratching at it?"

"No. Nothing more than usual."

"I don't like the look of it." Hermione's frown intensified and Elara drifted over to inspect the scar as well, going so far as to run her fingertip over the thickest vein of gnarled tissue. Her hands were cold. "You should go to Madam Pomfrey. Or even Professor Dumbledore, since it's an old injury."

"What does that have to do with it?"

"It's part of the school's public information, the same place I learned of the professors' qualifications." Noticing Harriet and Elara's blank expressions, Hermione rolled her eyes. " _Honestly_. 'Hogwarts' attending healer cannot affect maladies, deformities, or injuries accrued outside of term without giving knowledge to and acquiring consent from the patient's parent or guardian.' There is a bylaw, though, that allows the Headmaster or the student's Head of House to grant permission in special cases or emergencies, _in loco parentis_."

Harriet blinked. "It _terrifies_ me that you have all that memorized."

Pansy came strutting out of the washroom and went to her trunk. "Dumbledore's not here," she commented in passing, digging through her possessions until she found the blue top she sought. "Saw him leave like ten minutes ago."

Pain prickled in Harriet's neck and straightened her back. "What do you mean he's not here?"

"Do you need to clean out your ears, Potter? I'm not going to repeat myself."

"Where has he gone?"

Pansy propped her hands on her hips and scoffed. "How in the world would _I_ know? Or even care? I only know this because Daphne and Millicent and Tracey and me were sitting out by the lake with Draco and Greg and Vince—." Pansy giggled and Elara grimaced, though Pansy didn't see. "And we—well, anyway, we saw the old man leave through the front gates in a hurry and Disapparate."

Harriet didn't know what Disapparate meant and didn't let that distract her. As far as she knew, the Headmaster never left the school while in classes were in session. Why leave now? Why had he been called away so suddenly? She hopped upright and, disregarding the robes thrown across the foot of her bed, snatched her wand from the nightstand and stashed it into the brace on her forearm. "I need to go talk to—someone."

Confused, Hermione asked, "Who?" even as Harriet hurriedly stuffed her feet into her shoes.

"I don't know," she confessed. "I just—I have a really bad feeling about _you know what_." She let her eyes drift toward the small shelf above her bed, where _A Compendivm of Defense Against Magic Moste Dark_ and _101 Legendary Artefacts of the Wizarding World_ sat.

Hermione's eyes widened with comprehension and Elara crossed her arms, the tension in the room increasing as Pansy looked between them. "What are you talking about?"

"I think I'm going to go see Snape," Harriet said—even if the idea sounded barmy even in her own mind. She couldn't decide if Snape hated her or not, given he either seemed intent on burdening her with as many detentions as possible or completely ignoring Harriet. Sometimes, though, in the quiet of the dungeons when he set her to task and sat behind his desk doing his markings or checking his inventories, she could ask him a question and the professor would answer, sometimes with his familiar sarcastic snark and sometimes with resigned weariness. He'd probably tell Harriet she was an idiot, but she would feel better for hearing it from someone who knew what he was talking about.

"Snape?" Elara echoed. "I'd be worried he'd poison me again if I were you."

Pansy gave her a scandalized look and almost dropped the blouse in her hands. "Like Professor Snape would bother poisoning a weird half-blood nerd like her. She probably faked the whole thing."

"Funny, Parkinson. You sounded convinced when you screamed bloody murder in the Great Hall."

Elara and Pansy's bickering gave Harriet the opening she needed to escape the dorm, and she flashed a grateful—if strained—smile in the older girl's direction before hurrying into the corridor. Slytherins milled about the common room, basking in the freedom provided post-examinations, and they gave the bespectacled witch scurrying for the exit little thought. Harriet wished she'd taken Livi with her, but she wouldn't have had the chance to pull him from the covers with Pansy there, and really, Snape should still be in his classroom, only a short jaunt down the hall, either proctoring a test or finishing one up.

Harriet was almost there, too, when she collided with a body around a blind corner where the dungeon corridors bisected one another. She caught herself against the stone wall and winced at the renewed pain in her neck, blinking through tears as she looked at the figure shadowed by doused torchlight.

"…Professor Quirrell?"

He said nothing, standing stiffly, crookedly, as if lame in one leg or in pain, until he whispered. "…yes, why not?"

Before he could say more or Harriet could react, the wizard moved and magic winnowed through the enclosed space. A sudden burst of red light was the last thing Harriet saw before the world went dark.

xXxXxXx

"…can't do it, Master. I can see it, can see myself giving it to you, but oh where is it? I don't understand—."

" _Quiet, you fool_."

Groggy, Harriet became aware again in tenuous increments; her senses reignited one by one, hearing the high, cold voice and the downtrodden muttering, pain in her oddly bent leg and numb hands, candlelight fluttering against her eyelids. She sucked in a breath and blinked until she could make sense of the scene before her.

She was in the Headmaster's office—or, rather, she leaned against one of the battered trunks in the spare room off the Headmaster's office, and in front of her a hunched Professor Quirrell whimpered as he looked in the gilded Mirror of Erised.

He hadn't seen her yet, or at least Harriet thought he hadn't. She doubted anyone else was about, given her hands were bound behind her back and the wizard in his purple turban was wholly absorbed with the mirror, but there _were_ people in the office; _painted_ people, dozens of them. If she could get the attention of the portraits….

No sooner had Harriet sucked in a breath to scream then Quirrell spun on his heels, wand raised, and snapped, " _Colloportus_!"

The door slammed shut with a tremendous bang. Quirrell turned his wand on Harriet and she choked, terrified, an eerie, not entirely lucid grin splitting the wizard's wan face. The single candle that gave light to the room had gone out when the door slammed, and now the only illumination came through the boarded up window, sharp bars of late day sunlight slicing across Quirrell's front and the Mirror behind him.

"Good afternoon, Miss Potter. If you scream, I will kill you."

Harriet tried to gather her scrambled wits, terror drying her mouth and throat until she could hardly swallow. "Wh—wh—?"

Quirrell sniffed, annoyed, and turned to the Mirror again. He touched the glass with his left hand and let his fingers play over the frame's intricate design as he mumbled and hummed. "Where _is_ it? How did the old fool manage…?"

Oh, Harriet knew what the wizard wanted; since that sunny afternoon with Hagrid a month ago, she'd been harboring a heavy suspicion about the looking glass sequestered away in the Headmaster's discreet keeping. As Elara'd noted, Professor Dumbledore's blatant mention of the third-floor corridor at the Welcoming Feast had surely drawn attention and suspicion to the place, including the attention and suspicion of anyone looking for the Philosopher's Stone, but the Mirror—in contrast—was safely tucked away. Harriet only knew of it by chance.

If Quirrell was after the Stone, that would make him—.

Harriet's heart started to beat very fast indeed as she struggled against the bonds on her wrists. Set pooled beneath her and she felt the featherlight touch of shadows creeping across her skin, plucking at the ropes.

"Master, I do not know what to do!"

Quirrell sudden cry jerked Harriet's attention back to the wizard.

" _Use the girl_ …."

The chilling voice spoke from thin air and Quirrell spun about, Harriet scuffing her shoes as she tried to scramble away from his reaching hand, but Quirrell managed to haul her upright. Having sat on her left leg too long, it gave beneath the sudden weight and Harriet slumped to her knees before the Mirror, dangling from Quirrell's grasp.

"Tell me what you see, girl."

Harriet didn't see anything. The images within the Mirror flickered and morphed as different scenes battled for dominance. Her deepest desire changed every second or so as Harriet vacillated between fear and anger, horror and disbelief, stubbornness and desperation.

"I—I don't know."

The angle was awkward, but Quirrell managed to strike her across the face with his wand hand. Harriet tasted iron as her teeth cut her lower lip—and she remembered being struck by Uncle Vernon in a similar manner all those months ago and crying in the cupboard afterward, alone. Always alone.

In the Mirror, Lily Potter knelt to embrace the image of her daughter. Tears spilled from Harriet's eyes.

"You're not worth the time I wasted brewing that poison," Quirrell said before tossing her aside. Harriet landed on her back, wincing as her arms twinged, but Set returned to fraying the bonds once out of the wizard's sight.

" _Let me speak with her_ …."

Quirrell paused, head tilting as if listening to something Harriet couldn't hear. "Are you certain, M-master?"

" _Do not question me, Quirrell_ …."

Without further prompting, the wizard tucked his wand into his belt and began to unwrap his turban. Withered garlic cloves fell from the loosening cloth with distinct plops, and the smell of rot mixing with the sulfurous garlic odor overwhelmed Harriet as bile burned in her throat. She retched.

The last of the turban fell like the cloves and Quirrell turned his back. Harriet wished he hadn't.

She had no words for the abomination before her; it defied description, and the longer she looked, the more terrified Harriet became. A second face protruded from Quirrel's skull, two slits approximating nostrils, a slash where the lipless mouth opened and sharp teeth shone, red eyes peering right at her. The skin was peeling in great chunks and bruises mottled Quirrell's cranium like mold on cheese.

Harriet felt faint.

"Not a pretty sssight, is it, Miss Potter?" the second face mocked, the voice frigid and raspy, sibilating from the malformed jaw. "See what I have been reduccced to? Possessing snakes and lesser wizards, skulking in the dark, playing Dumbledore's ridiculous gamesss. See what I, the greatessst wizard who ever lived, have become?"

 _Oh, no_. She realized Quirrell wasn't just an agent for the Dark Lord; he bloody _was_ the Dark Lord, or least a carrier for the Dark wizard's twisted remnant.

If she didn't do something, she knew she wasn't going to leave that room alive.

"He thought to trap me, Dumbledore, that wretched old fool. Sought to trick me, thought to outsssmart _me_ , but I am far too clever for such pitiful attempts. You're clever too, aren't you, Harriet?" the voice crooned. "A Ssslytherin, like me. You know what I am after. Look into the Mirror. Give me what I want. You and your friendsss are smart, aren't you, Harriet? You will be given everything if you assissst Lord Voldemort…."

"No!" Harriet yelled, trembling. "I would never help you! You killed my parents!"

Voldemort hissed his displeasure. "I can give them back to you, silly girl. What Voldemort takes away, he can return…."

For the briefest of moments, hope blossomed in Harriet's heart—and once it decayed, Harriet hated the wizard more than she ever had before, because she knew he lied and she hated that, even for an instant, she'd considered betraying her parents, her friends, the whole of the Wizarding world, for a selfish dream that could never be.

"I will let you share in that eternal life, Harriet…. You and your family could live forever…."

Mustering strength, Harriet spat, "No one lives forever," and Set tore the ropes free. Harriet did the only thing she could think to do, and lunged at Quirrell.

The wizard stumbled and Voldemort yelled, wordless and furious, Harriet's sore hands fumbling to grasp Quirrell's wand, pulling—.

An elbow collided with her collarbone. Fresh pain lit through her scar, blazing incandescent, and Harriet's vision blurred before she fell, and the wand slipped through her fingertips. It bounced once, then rolled below a cabinet, out of sight.

 _He doesn't have a wand now! I can do it! I can escape—!_

Quirrell reached into his sleeve and Harriet stopped breathing when he retrieved her own wand. Of course. She'd forgotten in her terror, but Quirrell must have disarmed her after hexing her in the corridor, and now he towered over Harriet with her pale wand clasped in his hand, a wicked grin playing across his cruel features.

" _Kill her!_ " Voldemort shrieked.

Harriet drew in a breath to scream.

Quirrell raised the wand and, still smiling, said, " _Avada Kedavra!_ "


	38. shattered

**_xxxviii. shattered_**

The agony struck before Severus could call an end to his sixth year N.E.W.T class.

The students were intent over their cauldrons, Volubilis Potions bubbling away, careful measurements of hellebore syrup being diluted and stirred while the withered faces of chopped up mandrakes dissolved in the brews. Between one step and the next, Severus gasped and stumbled as he brought his arm to his chest and very nearly knocked Lauri Lyons' cauldron to the floor. The freckled witch gawked at him and Severus sneered through the lank curtain of his hair.

"You have five minutes," he announced to the room at large, a slight roughness in his quiet baritone the only indication of the pain wracking his right hand. "By now you should be decanting your potion, and if you have not provided me with your sample at the end of those five minutes, you will fail."

Severus returned to his desk and dropped into his chair. In his lap, he attempted to unfurl his clenched fingers and failed as the muscles seized. _What the fuck has she done now?_ he thought, loosening his wand from its brace so he could slip the stick into his left hand. Casting with a non-dominant hand could prove disastrous—and no matter how many contrary little dunderheads squawked " _But I'm ambidextrous,_ " magic did _not_ flow in symmetry through the body—though Albus proved proficient enough. Albus Dumbledore wasn't a good marker for what the average wizard could achieve.

Concentrating, Severus whispered, " _Fretum_ ," and cool, green mist spooled around his wrist and forearm. By no means powerful, the numbing Charm blunted the pain enough for Severus to clench his wand in his proper hand and suck air through his crooked teeth. _Shit_.

He retained the proper, passive facade until the very last student—twitchy Lauri Lyons—all but dropped her vial on the desk's top. The bottle hadn't settled before Severus Vanished the lot to the storage cupboard and got to his feet. "Class dismissed."

The sixth years clamored to collect their possessions and didn't notice Severus dart out the door, his footsteps quiet but urgent, the numbness fading with every fiery pulse caused by the Vow. His heart thumped against his sternum like a small, shriveled hummingbird trying to escape. _Damn it, wretched girl, where is she?_

Severus rounded the corner and the common room's entrance came into sight—as did Elara Black and Hermione Granger, the pair deep in heated conversation, their expressions as taut as the body language suggested they were.

"Black, Granger—."

Before he could demand the girl's whereabouts, Black lifted her chin and demanded, "Where's Harriet?"

 _What?_

Granger pursed her lips and huffed. "What she means, sir, is that Harriet left the common room about twenty minutes ago and she—. Well, she said she had a bad feeling about _you know what_."

"About—?"

"About the Philosopher's Stone," Black clarified, obviously in no mood for prevaricating. Severus' eyes widened. _Hell. How do they know about the Stone?!_ "Parkinson came into the dorm and said the Headmaster has left the castle and Harriet popped up and said she needed to go talk to _you_."

Severus' mind worked quickly as the pain tightened in his wrist again, echoes of agony spiraling through his elbow and to the tips of his fingers. Potter never arrived at his classroom, which meant she had lied to her friends, or—.

 _Or she was taken._

He flicked his wand and the silver doe warbled into relief, almost transparent from lack of concentration. "Recall the Headmaster!" Severus ordered the Patronus, and it bounded through the solid stone wall, the two witches gawking at the spell as the silver light faded from their faces.

"Return to the common room."

"But—."

" _Now!_ " Severus thundered. His voice echoed in the dungeons' narrow confines, and both Granger and Black grudgingly retreated. The entrance closed behind them and Severus rapped his wand against the wall's stone to activate the castle's wards. Technically, the power should be beyond him as a simple teacher, but Severus had been given the ability when he'd been Head of Slytherin House as Albus now turned a convenient blind eye to the forgotten permissions. It made things easier, what with Slytherin himself being utterly unaccountable half the time.

He flicked his wand again and an even weaker Patronus emerged, but it would suit his purposes. "Minerva," he said. "Lockdown the castle."

As the doe disappeared, Severus set off at speed, robes flaring, wand clenched in a white-knuckled fist as he ran up the steps two at a time. His arm quivered.

 _I've waited too long. Five minutes was too long. Let them blow up the ruddy classroom for all I care, I waited too long now, and she's—_.

"Severus," Slytherin acknowledged as he came swanning out of the Great Hall, prowling for what drama and mischief he could capitalize on. He spotted the Potions Master and stilled, registering the other wizard's urgency, the rigidity of Severus' expression and the speed of his gait. The mocking smirk dissipated into blank awareness, not unlike a snake coiling in upon itself, waiting for the opportune moment to strike.

"He's called our bluff and taken a student," Severus said without slowing. Slytherin swore and fell into step with him.

The staircases moved to ease their passage, and a moment later Minerva's voice echoed through the halls and boomed across the grounds. " _Students are to return to their dormitories immediately._ "

Time slogged on. His footsteps echoed, his breath grown ragged as he all but ran the bloody length of the castle, though he couldn't hear Slytherin at all. Agony surged through his skin, but Severus embraced the sensation and willed it to continue, because so long as he remained in pain, the girl lived, and that certainty was worth the torment.

Dumbledore's plan had been bound to fail from the beginning, Severus told himself. It was too complicated—and, in the same breath, too simple, and he should have known failure was imminent when _Slytherin_ agreed with the idea. _Naturally_ , he agreed; it fed his sense of the theatrical, and the rouse may have deterred _him_ for a time, but the Dark Lord—in any iteration—was wily, capable, and only became more cunning as time progressed.

They were never going to win.

A small, self-defeating voice whispered, _The greatest mercy you'll receive is ceasing to exist when the girl does. Perhaps, even in this, Lily was looking out for you._

Severus shook his head, furious with himself, as they came onto the seventh-floor corridor. The gargoyle leapt aside without prompting and he almost fell when he hit the spiral stairs at full pace. He thought Slytherin said something along the lines of "Where the hell is Dumbledore—?" but the blood rushing in his ears made it difficult to hear anything aside from his screaming pulse, his wand wavering, blood in his mouth, teeth buried in his tongue to abate the swelling fire gorging on his bones.

Then, the pain stopped.

The storage room's door was locked, as expected. Muffled sobbing broke the otherwise stilted, worried whispering of the portraits, who could hear the sound but had no vantage into the room itself. Severus tried the handle, then took a step back, bringing his wand down in a practiced slash. " _Aperianuam_!"

The magical seal on the door gave as it flung itself open, revealing the darkened room beyond. Potter sat on the bare floor, sobbing, blood on her lip, and before the shattered remnants of the Mirror of Erised lay the crumpled body of Quirinus Quirrell.

Minus the back of his head, of course.

Slytherin took in the scene with the dispassionate air of a casual observer, equally as irked by Potter's tears as he was bemused by Quirrell's shattered visage. Frayed ropes lay by Quirrell's leg, and in his hand he clutched a wand—Potter's wand, Severus recognized. "My, my," Slytherin said. "It seems the _Muggle_ Studies professor was our little agent all along. I wouldn't have thought the stuttering fool capable of it."

Potter sucked in a shuddering gasp and looked at her Head of House, then turned to Severus. Her green eyes were raw with tears.

"Miss Potter, are you all right?" Severus asked. _Of course she's not all right, you twit._ A part of him wanted to scream at the girl out of sheer bloody relief. _What happened?_

The girl sniffled and wiped snot on her sleeve. Disgusted, Severus conjured a handkerchief and handed it to her, and Potter blew her nose like a trumpet before she answered. "'M okay, professor."

A sudden blast of hot wind and searing light brought Severus and Slytherin around, their wands raised, and the Headmaster appeared from nothing with his phoenix perched on his shoulder and steel in his blue eyes. Severus lowered his wand in an instant, though Slytherin's lingered, his lips pulled back in a displeased curl.

Dumbledore cast one cold look in the Defense professor's direction before disregarding the man entirely and going to Potter's side. "Harriet," he said, extending his hand for her to take. "Harriet, my girl, can you stand?"

She tried to, and Severus intervened before the chit could yank the elderly wizard right off his feet. He took firm hold of her skinny arm and the girl leaned into his grip, content to hang limp and shiver.

"He—he—," the girl choked between heaving breaths. "He cursed m-me, in the dungeons. W-with something red."

 _Stunner_ , Severus' mind supplied.

"A-and I woke up here. He wanted the Ph-Philosopher's Stone, wanted me to get it f-for him, but I didn't know how." Potter swallowed and shook so hard Severus could feel it in his own bones. "He—it was Vol—the Dark Lord," she whispered. "He had the Dark Lord with him, _inside_ of h-him, on the back of his head—."

Dumbledore's brow furrowed and dread sung in Severus' veins. _The Dark Lord_. He had always thought Quirrell to be an odd character and his sabbatical on the continent had only exacerbated his eccentricities, but the Potions Master hadn't suspected _this_. He hadn't suspected poor fumbling, feeble-mouthed, Muggle-loving Quirrell of anything at all.

"H-he used a spell when I—when I tried to grab his wand." She pointed toward a cabinet, beneath which peeked the edge of a dropped wand. "He had mine and he said something, s-something I don't know—." The girl swallowed. "A spell. There was a green light, and then—."

The three men in the room froze. The portraits in the office continued to squabble among themselves and Potter's breathing remained ragged, but Severus, Slytherin, and Dumbledore said nothing at all. Slytherin traced the large cracks splintering what fragments remained in the Mirror's frame. "Well," he whispered. "Isn't _that_ interesting."

Albus picked up the wand from Quirrell's limp, dead hand, and stared at it. "It is indeed…Tom."


	39. never prosper

**_xxxix. never prosper_**

"Drink."

Harriet looked at the vial tucked into her pale, trembling hand and did not drink. She stared at the opaque blue liquid and remembered, oddly enough, the sound of the Mirror of Erised breaking. It should have been on the low-end of memorable events this afternoon, and yet Harriet couldn't forget the crash and the subsequent pinging of jagged glass bouncing on the stones as Quirrell slumped to his knees and fell forward.

Then the wraith had burst from his skull and screamed, " _This isn't over, Potter!_ " while the glass continued to rain.

Harriet jumped when Snape snatched the vial from her and uncorked it with one practiced hand, holding the rim to her mouth. " _Drink_ it."

"Severus, a modicum of care at this moment would go a long way—."

Harriet didn't hear the rest of Dumbledore's statement because she swallowed the silty blue potion and everything ceased to matter. Harriet stopped thinking about the glass, about Quirrell's dead eyes, Voldemort's screams, or the vibrant green flash that poured from her own wand and flung itself back at the wizard who cast it. She barely noticed when the Heads of Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, and Hufflepuff came streaming into the office and all began to talk at some volume. Harriet just sat in the wing chair by the fire with Snape watching her until the mediwitch came, at which point Madam Pomfrey began bickering with Dumbledore as she healed Harriet's busted lip and smeared a nice, cool cream on her aching shoulder, neck, and chest.

A white sheet covered a Conjured cot, Quirrell's body stretched out beneath it. Muggles did that too, Harriet knew from catching snippets of Dudley's programs. They covered their dead in clean white sheets. The strange, unexpected commonality almost had her breaking out in a hysterical, giggling fit.

By the time the world came back into focus, Harriet felt much calmer and the body had gone, as had everyone but for Professor Dumbledore. The Headmaster sat in another wing chair across from her, his profile highlighted by the flickering fire in the hearth, the windows grown heavy and drab with sunset. He noticed Harriet's rapid blinking as she straightened and sucked in a breath.

"I believe Professor Snape was a bit heavy-handed with the Calming Draught," he said with a small smile. "He means well, of course. Lemon sherbet, Harriet?"

The end table balancing the colorful candy dish scuttled closer on spindly, delicate legs and leaned to offer up a sweet. Harriet stared at the candy dish for a moment before taking one.

"I had a bad dream with lemon sherbets in it," she said, not quite sure why she was mentioning the weird nightmare. It seemed surreal after having watched a man with a ghost in his head accidentally kill himself.

"Oh?"

"Mhm. I wanted something sweet and the gargoyle told me all he had were lemon sherbets. He sent me out to the Forbidden Forest where there were lots of mirrors and a cupboard that I hid in to escape."

"To escape what?"

"I'm not sure, sir." Harriet popped the little yellow candy into her mouth and the sour taste helped further clear her mind. "I have that dream a lot, though."

The Headmaster studied her over the top of his half-moon spectacles. "Curious," he decided, taking one of the candies himself. "I'm sure Professor Trelawney would have much to say about your dreams. She's the Divinations teacher, you see." Professor Dumbledore said this with a wry note to his voice that puzzled Harriet, but the elderly wizard simply shook his head. "Never mind, my dear. You've been through a great deal and I've no doubt that listening to an old man's prattling isn't high on your priorities. I did want to ask you about…this."

He held up Harriet's wand, which she'd quite forgotten about in all the commotion. "That's mine, sir."

"Yes. Tell me, Harriet, where did you receive this wand?"

"From Ollivanders, Professor."

The Headmaster lifted one brow in disapproval. "Now, I think we both know that's not true, my girl."

Not precisely, no, but the truth was infinitely odder than the lie, and though Harriet had come to learn many fantastical things in the magical world, she knew some things were still labeled as ' _weird,_ ' and possibly possessed shadows fit neatly into that category. "I'm not sure," she said instead. "I know it's not the same as it was, but I don't actually know what happened to it. It _is_ the wand I got at Ollivanders, Professor, I promise. It's just—different now."

Professor Dumbledore made a thoughtful sound as his fingertips moved over the surface of the wand and he relinquished it to Harriet. "It's made of elder wood, I believe. A very rare kind of instrument indeed; according to Garrick Ollivander, it takes a rather special and talented kind of wizard—or witch—to master a wand of elder."

Harriet blushed.

"I could guess at the core, but I believe such projections would be best left to others, because I couldn't say for certain. It is a very loyal wand, one of a pair."

"A pair?" Harriet asked. "Who owns the other one?"

The Headmaster shrugged, then extracted his own wand from a fold in his navy blue robes. "Me."

It certainly looked like Harriet's wand, the same pale wood and of similar length, but the professor's had more design to it, a band with funny markings about the part where his knuckles rested and several pitted protuberances, kinda like the knobbly tops of bones Harriet had seen pictures of in her old Muggle texts. Her own was like a very thin, tightly wound tree branch with funny markings on it from Set's fingers.

"As I said, they're very loyal wands, Harriet. They can prove quite difficult, impossible in most cases, to turn against their chosen master, and if someone were to attempt casting a deadly curse against the will of the wand—well, I would think that someone might find themselves the recipient of their own misdeed."

Harriet's eye wandered over where the Conjured cot had stood and she gripped her wand tight. Dumbledore watched her, and for a moment looked nothing like the spry, gentle Headmaster she'd come to expect, but rather an aging wizard with a great weight upon his shoulders.

"I'm sorry, Headmaster," she mumbled. "I shouldn't have left the dorm on my own."

Dumbledore let out a short breath of disbelief and smiled. "Oh, my girl, it's not your fault."

"No," Harriet agreed, staring at her scraped knees. Madam Pomfrey must have missed those. "But I knew I should be careful. Hermione and Elara always tell me that. And I—I meant to take Livi—." She cast a furtive glance in the Headmaster's direction. "But I had to leave him behind. I should've known better." In afterthought, she added, "He's gonna come after me again, isn't he, sir? Voldemort is?"

He didn't respond immediately; instead, Professor Dumbledore returned his wand to his pocket and eyed the window, night coming to sit prim upon the sill, the final whisper of sunlight still caught in the dust that lingered there, speckled spots of brilliance on an otherwise dim surface. She felt anything _but_ calm, and yet Harriet relaxed despite herself, holding onto her wand as if she'd never let it go and wishing she could thank Set for setting her free earlier. She would've died without him.

"Harriet, I once told you that you were what Voldemort considered a mistake, but not for the reasons that you believe, or even for the reasons _he_ believes. Sometimes…sometimes it is not the blow that kills us, but the _wound_."

"The wound, Professor?"

"Yes. You see, when he attacked your family that Hallowe'en, Voldemort very much intended to kill you, Harriet. He did not overlook you; much like Quirrell, he attempted to curse you—and failed."

Harriet's hand crept upward until it cupped the sore side of her neck, the cream Madam Pomfrey had spread still tacky beneath her rumpled shirt. "Why…why did he fail?"

"I believe it was because of your mother. I believe Voldemort meant to spare her, but Lily refused to step aside, and her sacrifice—her _love_ —invoked an old and very powerful kind of magic that we may never really understand, a kind of inscrutable, uncontrollable, _wonderful_ magic Voldemort fears above all else. It's the same kind of magic you feel in your heart when you look at your friends or think of your parents, dear girl."

Her eyes stung and Harriet stared again at her knees.

"He wounded himself when he attacked you. He broke himself truly, though he didn't shatter. He fled your home, mortally wounded—though, in his arrogance, I doubt he saw it as such—and attempted to rejoin his followers in Dorset, where they had been sent on their own mission to raid another wizarding home."

Slowly, Harriet lifted her head and found the Headmaster watching her closely as he continued speaking.

"I do not know how he managed to leave your home at all that night. Something of his being persisted, a thread of himself keeping the whole together, fraying from the moment he spoke the curse meant to end your life, and when he attempted the same spell again, before he could even manage to summon the words, Voldemort soul gave out, and he became what he is today—a wraith who cannot live, and who cannot die. And it is all because of you and your mother, Harriet."

The bespectacled girl had to swallow twice before she could speak, and even then her voice escaped in a thin, terrified whisper. "But…but Neville, he's the Boy Who—."

Professor Dumbledore shook his head and dread tightened in Harriet's middle.

"Neville is a brave boy who lost his mother and nearly his own life that night, but he is no more the cause of Voldemort's downfall than myself or this candy dish."

"But—but, bloody hell, Professor, he's famous!" Harriet winced at her own cursing, but the Headmaster only shrugged.

"He attracts a great deal of attention, yes. A rather large detachment of Aurors from the Department of Magical Law Enforcement is tasked with his safety, and both his father, Frank Longbottom, and his stepmother, Catherine Blishen, are aware of what truly transpired that night. Frank, and his late wife Alice, were quite devoted to seeing Voldemort defeated."

Harriet felt nauseous as she struggled to keep her head from spinning out of control. She'd wondered on many occasions how it was possible for her to survive that night and had dozens of her own speculations on the dilemma. Those speculations, though, had turned themselves on their heads when she went with Hagrid to feed the Thestrals and realized she must have witnessed the death of one of her parents. _How did I survive? Apparently, madmen will overlook you if they've already killed you._ It made an awful, terrible kind of sense. "Neville's like the third-floor corridor."

"In a manner of speaking, yes. A clever way to put it."

"And I'm…I'm the Mirror of Erised."

Again, Dumbledore nodded and Harriet turned her face to the fire. "That's rather Slytherin thinking, isn't it, Headmaster?"

"To quote Professor Snape; 'if one wants anything at all to be done, then they'd best find a Slytherin with an ounce of sense in his head, because that's an ounce more than anyone else has.'"

Harriet snorted, covering her mouth, and Professor Dumbledore chuckled. She laughed more fully at the sound and a measure of tension left her upset, nervous stomach, allowing Harriet to feel more herself than she had since stepping foot into that office. "Sir, why couldn't Vol—Voldemort get the Stone out of the Mirror? I think that's why he brought me along, in the end. He couldn't figure out how to get it and thought I might be able to."

"Ah, it's one of my cleverer ideas, if I do say so myself. Anyone who wished to possess the Stone to _use_ it could not possess it, but a person simply wishing to keep the Stone from harm could be given it quite easily. If I may ask; what did you see when you looked into the Mirror?"

"I didn't see any of that, sir. I just…I just saw my mum."

Dumbledore nodded as if he'd expected nothing else. "Yes, that's evidence of your Slytherin character— no, my dear girl, I don't mean that as an insult. Quite the opposite, in fact. You see, Slytherin House has a poor reputation, and even I myself have been swayed by that prejudice in the past—but over the years I have come to learn that those who find themselves Sorted into Slytherin are often of a singular character, possessors of quick-wit, ambition, and their own kind of bravery. Hufflepuffs are kind even when it's difficult to be so, Gryffindors brave in the presence of fear, Ravenclaws inquisitive even when challenged, and Slytherins are unbelievably loyal to those who've earned their trust, even in the face of great temptation."

"I…I don't know if I'm any of those things, Professor."

"But you are, Harriet. I'm certain he tried to tempt you; far better witches and wizards than you and I have fallen prey to Voldemort's false promises, and many more will, before the end. However, you didn't give in. You _resisted_."

"I almost didn't," Harriet confessed, horrified at the quiet words coming out of her mouth. "For a second, I…he promised…."

When it became clear Harriet couldn't continue, Dumbledore asked with plain curiosity, "So why did you deny him?"

"Because he's a liar!" she snapped, tears stinging her eyes again. "Because he's the one who _took_ them from me. I just…I just wanted my family back."

The Headmaster leaned forward to grasp Harriet's hand in his own. "And therein lies your greatest strength and your greatest weakness, my dear; _loyalty_. An old proverb in our Wizarding community says 'a Slytherin who cheats at cards and steals your wife says nothing when you take his gold and give him strife, but threaten his family and you'll meet his knife.' A bit melodramatic, but it makes a poignant point. You saw your mother, Harriet, because you didn't care about Voldemort or the Philosopher's Stone; you cared about _her_."

Harriet gave the Headmaster's hand a squeeze before letting go and mulling over his words. It was selfish of her, she decided, not caring about the Stone or Voldemort or any of that. She never felt like much of a Slytherin, having grown up downtrodden and decidedly Muggle, concepts of normality drummed into her head like a stick beating a snare drum— _freak, freak, freak_. Hermione was clever and quick-witted, Elara was cunning and proud, and Harriet—.

Well, Harriet didn't know what she was.

"The Philosopher's Stone is gone, isn't it, sir?" she asked. "Because the Mirror's broken?"

Dumbledore sighed and adjusted his spectacles. "Yes, unfortunately."

"What's going to happen to Nicholas Flamel? He'll die without the Stone, won't he?"

"Oh, you know about Nicholas, do you?" He smiled when Harriet nodded. "Nicholas knew there would be risks in lending me his stone—the worst of which was possibly having it stolen by Voldemort. He has enough Elixir for himself and Perenelle to set their affairs in order, and I imagine that, at the end of the day, they were prepared for this eventuality. To live forever is a great burden, Harriet. A quiet death can just as often be a gift as it can seem a curse."

"I'm sorry."

"It wasn't your fault, dear girl."

"I still think it should be said, Professor. He's your friend."

The Headmaster met her gaze and Harriet saw the briefest flash of profound sadness in the wizard's blue eyes before he stood from his comfortable chair. "Come along now. I've kept you far too long and Madam Pomfrey will have my beard if you don't get the rest you deserve."

He walked her toward the waiting door, past the storage room where she saw Quirrell kill himself, Dumbledore's hand coming to rest on her shoulder so Harriet wouldn't stop and stare. "He's…Voldemort's going to return, isn't he, Professor?"

"Not today, Harriet."

"And when he does, sir?"

He considered her, then opened the door with a wave of his hand. "Then we'll be prepared. But, as I said, that day is not today."

Harriet left the office. She wiped her face when the cooler air on the stairs chilled the smudged tears on her cheeks, and she found none other than Professor Snape waiting in the hall outside the gargoyle. Clearly in a dark mood, he pointed in the direction that would lead them to the common room and they set out without a word, the Potions Master leaving once Harriet stumbled through Slytherin's secret entrance.

She didn't start crying until she entered the dark dormitory and changed into her nightgown. Harriet lay in bed and tried to smother her stupid sniffles, and suddenly Hermione and Elara were there, embracing her tight with whispered worry until Harriet buried her face in someone's shoulder and quietly sobbed herself to sleep.

She didn't dream.


	40. on your way to greatness

**_xl. on your way to greatness_**

Harriet felt as if she'd only just arrived at Hogwarts when summer descended upon them and it was time to depart.

Items were gathered and trunks were packed, final minute squabbles had, books Summoned through the air by forgetful students as familiars crawled about underfoot. Marks were distributed and no one was at all surprised to learn Hermione was top of their year overall. Elara had scored marginally better on their final Transfiguration exam, much to Hermione's frustration, and Neville Longbottom had earned top marks in Herbology.

To Harriet's absolute shock, she took first in Defense with what Hermione considered a wide margin between her and Longbottom in second. All subjects cumulated, Harriet ranked eleventh in her year, and she had never felt as proud of herself as she did when blinking dumbfounded at the listings posted in the common room. Attending primary with Dudley had meant having her homework stolen or handed in late, and as such Harriet had never taken much interest in learning—but here, at Hogwarts, with a world of magic at her fingertips, Harriet found she enjoyed studying, enjoyed classes and picking up new spells, listening to Hermione squeeze all sorts of information into her skull while Elara did her best to tutor her in Transfiguration.

She was grateful her friends were such bloody geniuses and hoped some of their intelligence rubbed off on her.

Professor Snape called Harriet into his office on the last day of term. She expected a detention or another punishment. Was summer detention a thing? Harriet had had enough of that at the Dursleys', thank you very much. She slunk into the cramped space wearing a pinched expression. Snape saw it immediately and scoffed.

"Don't look at me like that, Potter. Sit."

She tried to control her face as she sat and ended up looking mildly ill.

Unamused, Snape strode behind his desk and unlocked one of the drawers with a tap of his wand, extracting a familiar bundle of silvery fabric. Harriet forgot her frustration and instead gaped. The professor held the cloak out and, when Harriet reached for it, he jerked his hand back, ensuring he had her attention.

"You will use it only in _emergencies_ , girl," he said, pronouncing every word like a pebble being pinged off Harriet's forehead. "It is not a bloody toy. You will not abuse the privilege. You will not use it to gallivant about the school after hours or cause mischief with your cohorts. If I find that you have, I will take it back—and don't think that I can't or won't."

Despite the snarl in his voice, Harriet was as pleased as Punch. She'd been convinced Snape would never return the cloak, that he'd forgotten about it entirely or had simply thrown it out in a fit of pique or carelessness. He poured the cold cloth into Harriet's open hands and when she grinned, he blinked as if startled, looking at Harriet as if he'd never really seen her before. She doubted Snape ever had students _smile_ at him, and though Harriet thought the wizard spent far too much time being a miserable git, he _had_ been the first one through the door after what happened in the Headmaster's office. Harriet wouldn't forget that.

"Thank you, Professor Snape!"

He grunted and returned to his chair behind the desk, straightening the cuffs of his sleeves and staring resolutely at the far wall. "Remember what I said. Get out, Potter."

Harriet did as told, though she also hung back just long enough to yell "Have a good hols, Professor Snape!" as the door swung shut and she ran before he could change his mind about that detention.

At the Leaving Feast, Slytherin colors decked the Great Hall and Professor Dumbledore stood up, waiting for silence to fall across the chattering students so he could be heard. "Ah, another year gone! And I hope it has been an excellent year for all of you, and I hope you will indulge an old wizard's need to maunder before we tuck into our excellent meal. We've a House Cup to award it seems. In fourth place, we have Gryffindor with three hundred and twelve points; in third, our friends in Hufflepuff, with three hundred and fifty-two points; Ravenclaw is in second with four hundred and twenty-six points, and Slytherin stands at first with four hundred and seventy-two points."

The Slytherin table applauded themselves and a few of the other Houses gave perfunctory claps.

"Yes, well done again, Slytherin House. It would, however, be remiss of me not to take recent events into account."

The applause faded and many of the Slytherins were looking at the Headmaster with wariness, Professor Slytherin's red eyes narrowed at the older man, Snape's hand wrapped tight about his goblet's stem.

"No matter that you are in first already, I find it important to acknowledge every students' trials and successes so they can be recognized for their cunning, their brilliance, bravery, and humility in the face of difficult challenges and harrowing danger. To Misters Neville Longbottom and Ronald Weasley, I would like to award ten points each for their efforts in researching and warning the school of a danger that had gone unknown to the professors. Thank you, gentleman."

Gryffindor House cheered and Longbottom beamed, Ron shrugging off his brothers' well-meaning hair ruffling. Now that Dumbledore mentioned it, Harriet recalled Longbottom and Weasley wanting to go into the Restricted Section during the Yule hols to research something that began with "N," something Harriet suspected might be " _Nicholas Flamel_."

"To Misses Hermione Granger and Elara Black, I award ten points each for their care and consideration in regards to a classmate's protection and safety."

Harriet grinned at her best friends as their House clapped and whistled, even Malfoy and Parkinson begrudgingly bringing their hands together a few times. Hermione let out an embarrassed squeak, burying her head in her arms, and though Elara bore the attention with better poise, her cheeks did turn a flustered pink color.

"To our Head Girl, Miss Amanda Robinson, and our Head Boy, Ryan Uzkosk, for keeping calm, protecting and gathering younger students during a declared emergency, I award ten points each and wish them the absolute best in their adventures beyond our hallowed halls. Remember, Hogwarts is always here to help those who ask for it."

The Head Girl and Boy, a Hufflepuff and a Ravenclaw respectively, were applauded by their Houses and Harriet clapped too, because she could imagine how scary it must've been for other first years like herself, not knowing what was happening, why the school had been in lockdown, and she doubted they made things easy for Robinson and Uzkosk.

"And, finally, to Miss Harriet Potter, for remaining true to her friends, her family, her House, and herself in defiance of great evil and imminent threat, I award fifty points."

Harriet blushed from her head down to her toes when her House cheered, acting less dignified than a bunch of stiff pure-bloods usually did, though not as riotous as the Gryffindors would've been in a reversed situation. At the High Table, Harriet thought she saw Snape pinch the bridge of his nose in exasperation. Professor Slytherin clapped like his students and looked…curious, just as he had every time he saw Harriet in recent days. She couldn't decide if that was a good thing or not.

"Yes, congratulations again, Slytherin House. I wish all of us a lovely summer and hope you'll arrive in September ready to learn again; maybe we'll get to see the Great Hall in different colors next year, hmm?"

The Feast commenced, and the Headmaster's words stuck with Harriet throughout the meal, a grin at her lips that'd been more reticent of late. _For remaining true to her friends, her family, her House, and herself_. The older Slytherins smiled and shook Harriet's hand, looking _appreciative_ in a way her relatives never had, and Harriet herself felt proud—proud she'd done well in her classes, proud she'd made such wonderful friends, and proud that, in a moment of panic, she hadn't betrayed who she was. She hoped her mum and dad would be proud, too.

 _The Sorting Hat chose right_ , she told herself as she lifted her chin and looked at the enchanted ceiling. _I will do well in Slytherin_.

xXxXxXx

The train rattled on the rails as it chugged ever southward toward the distant horizon.

"I still don't understand what Professor Dumbledore's thinking," Hermione said, fidgeting with her forest green robes, causing the bench to squeak. "It doesn't make sense."

"It makes a perfect kind of sense, if that kind of sense is Dumbledore's," Elara countered as she lifted her nose from her journal. She, too, wore robes; a dark gray pair with sage lining and a high collar. Harriet, in contrast, dressed like a Muggle—though not her cousins' cast-offs, since those had met an unfortunate fate in the grate last summer. "He's privy to something we're not."

"Exactly," Hermione replied. "Why else would he keep _this_ a secret? And for so long."

"Longbottom could use a bit of a head shrinkage," Harriet grumbled, giving her feet a moody kick. Livi grew restless inside her thin jumper and popped his head out the bottom, tongue flickering, lounging across Harriet's lap. She rubbed his snout with little thought.

"To keep Harriet safe." Elara crossed one leg over the other and leaned back. "The Boy Who Lived attracts a certain amount of enmity and we can assume the _Girl_ Who Lived would be no different."

Harriet shuddered. "Ugh."

She'd told them all about Professor Quirrell, the Mirror of Erised, Quirrell's unsavory passenger, and what the Headmaster had told her afterward, despite the niggling fear that Elara and Hermione might decide friendship with her was too complicated or dangerous. Both had taken the news in stride, much to Harriet's relief, and they tried to puzzle out Dumbledore's decisions and actions when privacy allowed.

"But that's my point exactly, don't you see? Longbottom _is_ guarded. He is, arguably, more protected than Harriet, who's anonymity and safety depends upon a serendipitous rouse, and what's the point of that?"

"What do you mean?"

" _Why_ would Harriet need anonymity? Why was she denied the fame and attention given to Neville?"

Harriet huffed and unwrapped a Pumpkin Pasty. " _Please_. I'd rather eat my wand then put up with all that stupidity." She shoved half of the Pasty into her mouth and presented the other to Livi, crumpling the wrapper to stow it in her pocket. "After talking with Professor Dumbledore, I think…well, I _know_ he believes the Dark Lord's going to return."

"But what is the point of keeping you safe—? Oh, I didn't mean it like _that_ , honestly, Harriet. I mean theoretically. Neville is, for all intents and purposes, the Boy Who Lived. He has been brought up and touted as such for years; should he die, it would have the same impact upon the community as it would if Harriet died had she been rightfully identified. There must be a _reason_ that, in a worst-case scenario, it is plausible for Neville to die, but not for Harriet."

They sat in silence for a time, lost to their respective thoughts, and though it may have been macabre to consider the worth of a classmate's life against her own, Harriet was terribly glad Hermione and Elara were pragmatic enough to not make such projections personal.

Elara ran her fingers over the bent, worn edges of her journal's pages and said, "We're missing too many pieces of this puzzle, Hermione."

The bushy-haired girl exhaled and admitted defeat. "Yes, yes. You're right…."

All too soon, they slipped through London's peripheries and barreled on, the train rolling to a halt at Platform Nine and Three-Quarters where hundreds of parents stood about waiting for their children to disembark. Harriet pulled down her Charmed trunk, hoisted Livi higher, and followed her friends into the students streaming toward the doors. Her heart felt heavier with every step.

"I have to go," Hermione murmured once they stepped outside. Already she'd caught sight of Mr. and Mrs. Malfoy standing to the side like a pair of perfectly matched salt pillars, Malfoy Senior leaning on a black cane while he surveyed the moving crowd with impassive eyes. Hermione hugged Harriet, then Elara. "I'll write—if I can. I'm not sure—oh, I'll miss you both terribly."

"We'll see you in September."

Hermione smiled, and off she went to greet her foster guardians. Elara and Harriet parted ways at the busy Floo, though not before the former embraced the bespectacled witch tight and warned, "I _will_ be writing. And I expect you to send a letter back with Cygnus."

"'Course."

Elara held her skinny hand. "Tell me if you need anything while living with the Muggles."

Harriet didn't quite meet her eyes. "I will."

Then, Elara Black disappeared, just like Hermione had, and Harriet walked through the barrier into King's Cross Station alone aside from her serpentine companions and mischievous shadow. She strolled until she came to the avenue, where she tipped back her head and let the hot London sun warm her face, listening to the bustle of Muggle society around her, the honking horns, rolling tires, the screeching brakes of a lorry.

She took a breath, then let it out. She had nowhere to go and yet Harriet wasn't afraid, because Harriet Potter was a witch. She could talk to snakes, cast spells, and just days ago survived a confrontation with one of the Darkest wizards to ever live. Harriet Potter was a proud Slytherin, best friends with Hermione Granger and Elara Black, and was going to learn all the magic she could so, one day, she'd become great—because Harriet Potter was not afraid.

Not anymore.

"All right then. First stop on our way to greatness is…." Harriet stared at the pavement and, after swirling lazily about her feet, Set extended an arm and pointed along the avenue. "That way, I guess. Lovely. I think greatness needs a compass."

* * *

 **E**

* * *

 **A/N: That's the end of year one! *confetti***

 **Thank you to all my reviewers and commenters! I love to read your thoughts on the story!**

 **On a different note, I know my Dumbledore might be a bit OoC. I try to write him as I would expect a man supposedly as wise as Dumbledore, living in this altered world, would—and should—behave. I still expect he'll have spots of Gryffindor bias (like allowing Neville onto the Quidditch team), but he's going to be more straight-forward than canon Dumbledore, a bit more cunning, and more compassionate. This world has enough bloody Dark Lords, thank you very much.**


	41. bruises on the soul

**2\. THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS**

 _but be the serpent under't - w. shakespeare_

* * *

 ** _xli. bruises on the soul_**

The broom scraped along the floor and the sound echoed in Grimmauld Place's oppressive silence.

In Elara's limited memory, the house had never been as quiet and doom-laden as it was now; when Cygnus had been in residence, a breath of life wheedled through the place, and no matter how thin and sickly it'd been, Elara recalled a comforting weight to the occasional wet coughs or the raspy mutterings he shared with the portraits of his forefathers. Now, there was nothing. Aside from Kreacher, Elara Black was alone.

The bristles scratched the wood and she sighed as she lifted the dust pail and dumped its contents in the rubbish bin. The bin coughed, sputtering out half the dirt and earned a tight-lipped glare from Elara. A month had passed since her arrival at the London townhouse and most of her efforts had gone into fixing the damage accrued during her extended absence at Hogwarts. Kreacher, still moping over Cygnus' death, was of no help at all, and Elara didn't have the patience or the wherewithal to chastise him for it.

Giving up for the moment, Elara leaned the broom against the peeling wallpaper and dropped onto the divan below an open window. Outside, a transparent veil of magic created generations before Elara's own birth hung between the house and the sidewalk, blocking the Muggles' view of the property, glittering slightly in the afternoon sunshine. A paltry breeze crossed the sill and stirred the mottled curtains, and though she wished for it to stay, the breeze retreated and the air stilled again. Elara resigned herself to melting in the muggy heat.

Sprawled on the divan, she stared at the ceiling and its weathered paint, then raised one hand before her face. Elara peeled off the sweaty glove, then, with deliberate attention plucked at the buttons on her sleeve until she could yank it down to her elbow. The light played over her pale skin and the scars that started about halfway up her forearm gradually thickened to their worst around her wrists, looking like ugly, scarlet bangles embedded in the flesh.

Elara poked the scar sitting over the tendon that ran into her thumb and the digit trembled.

She sighed louder and dropped the arm onto her middle, then went about shedding her remaining glove and rolling back that sleeve as well. Unsightly as the scars were, the weather _was_ inexcusably hot and she _was_ alone. Matron Fitzgerald would've called it an "Indian Summer," but Elara was fairly certain that was the incorrect term, which didn't surprise her in the slightest. Bigoted and cruel, Matron Fitzgerald had also been a bit of an idiot.

A Doxy made a conspicuous show of tip-toeing back into the draperies Elara had de-infested the day before. She glowered at the tricky devil and, not for the first time, wished she knew and could perform the proper cleaning spells. Doing everything the Muggle way had quickly lost its charm.

Muffled flapping brought Elara's head up and she watched her owl Cygnus come winging through the open window, making a brief circuit around the dilapidated office before landing on the divan's arm. He pecked at her groomed head affectionately and Elara sent her fingers questing over his dark wing, feeling the sun's heat still trapped in the feathers.

"Thank you," she said once Cygnus proffered his leg for her to take the attached letter and package. He hooted, apparently finding her response acceptable, and took off through the open door to find his water dish. Elara pried the red seal open on the letter and proceeded to read. It was from Hermione.

 _Dear Elara,_

 _I hope your holidays are going well. I know only a month has passed, but it seems inexorably longer, doesn't it? I miss you and Harriet and Hogwarts terribly._

 _I'm sorry if I've been remiss in sending a letter earlier. Mr. Malfoy keeps us to a very strict studying schedule and I have not had the opportunity to use the owlery much._

Elara snorted. Between the lines, she read, " _Lucius Malfoy is a prig and he's not allowing me to use the owls._ " Hate was not a feeling she often relished, but Elara thought she might hate Lucius a little more each time she received another notice of investigation involving her emancipation from the Ministry. He could do nothing, and yet he persisted because he had the money, the time, and the desire to simply pester Elara constantly.

 _Have you had the chance to review Prof. McGonagall's summer assignment? It deals with the principles of Gamp's Laws in the Vera Verto spell, and though I've looked up the spell and its usage on aves, rodents, et al., I question the efficacy of the third string in the Conjuration wheel, wherein the inverted symbol for truth seems out of place—_.

Grinning, Elara quickly skimmed through what amassed to several rambling paragraphs concerning _Vera Verto_ , a spell they'd be learning next year, and its applications. It seemed Hermione was determined to place better than Elara in the upcoming year, and Elara looked forward to a bit of friendly competition.

Farther down the parchment, Hermione changed topics.

 _I've attached Harriet's birthday gift and would really appreciate it if you'd send it on for me. I'm—_ here a word had been delicately scratched out— _concerned about her. I know we haven't much discussed our home lives, but I also know you understand a bit more of her situation than I do, and I've come to think possibly her—_ again, another word was blackened by ink _—situation might well be a product of that unfortunate Hallowe'en_.

Elara hummed low, finger tapping the parchment. Harriet never spoke of her relatives, but she had the distinct misfortune of being friends with a pure-blood and a pure-blood's overly curious ward. The Noble House of Potter was notorious for producing single sons for generations; James to Fleamont to Charlus—though Elara hadn't traced the House farther than that, as the Blacks had married into the Potters at that point, which coincidently made Elara and Harriet third cousins.

Regardless of their relation, Harriet's father was known to have married "outside" the other families, which basically meant he'd married a Muggle-born. Harriet had mentioned her "aunt and uncle," and from then on Elara realized the bespectacled witch lived with Muggles on her mother's side, and she hadn't seemed particularly _pleased_ when summer rolled about. None of them had.

Elara contemplated the little package in which Harriet's present was contained and pursed her lips. She'd written to Harriet twice earlier in the month and both times Cygnus had returned rumpled and irritable, unable to deliver her messages, and if Elara hadn't known better, she would've said Cygnus hadn't been able to find Harriet because she was _moving_.

 _Whether or not that's true, I still hope she's well. Mr. Malfoy made a comment in passing about her the other day—_ Elara's eyes narrowed _—and I confess that I don't actually know where he might have heard about Harriet, unless Draco mentioned her. That seems unlikely, as he's far more prone to badmouthing you and me than Harriet._

Scoffing, Elara read Hermione's salutation and folded the letter again. She tucked Harriet's present into her skirt's pocket and took her time getting up, content to remain languid and close to the window's relief for a minute longer before returning to the main house's sticky heat. When she rose, Elara abandoned the office as a bad job for today and returned instead to her own bedroom across the hall.

The scantily clad swimsuit models scowled over the top of the parchment sheets covering their permanently stuck posters with, though she ignored them and went to the desk, sitting on the crooked stool. Balled up parchment and bits of old quills lay on the surface between heavy, dry tomes concerning Ministry and Goblin laws that Elara found _incredibly_ dry but endeavored to slog through nonetheless. She had a solicitor, Mr. Piers, but her late great-uncle had said it was stupid to place all of one's faith concerning financial matters in another's hands, and Elara agreed.

Even so, Elara _was_ still twelve and had to look up every third word or so written in the legal texts, making her studies very slow going.

Shuffling through the desk's top drawer, she retrieved a fresh sheet of parchment, then uncapped the inkwell and picked up a quill. The edge proved worn down and bent at the tip, but when she looked about for her Charmed trimming knife, she came up empty.

"Kreacher?" Elara called, waiting. When no response came, she huffed and tried again. "Kreacher!"

The old house-elf appeared with a crack of noise and a glower. "The blood-traitor's daughter is calling Kreacher?"

Elara pinched the bridge of her nose and squeezed her eyes shut for a moment. "Yes. Do you know where my trimming knife is, by chance?"

The elf snapped his knobby fingers and the little blade appeared in his hand.

"Oh. Thank you."

She reached for it—and suddenly remembered her arms were bare, and Kreacher's bloodshot eyes froze on the ugly blemishes before moving to her face. Elara felt as if he could see more than just the tarnishing marks on her flesh; Kreacher looked at her like he could see the very bruises on her soul and didn't like what he saw.

Elara snatched the knife from him and quickly turned away, shoving her sleeves back into their proper place. "That's all, Kreacher. Thank you."

She heard the house-elf's shuffling, uneven gait as he left the room, mumbling all the way to the hall and the stairs beyond. Elara gripped her wrist and shut her eyes, willing the creeping shame from her thoughts as the fixtures on the wall rattled and dust shook from the ceiling. She took one breath, then another, then opened her eyes and finished buttoning her cuffs.

 _Silly of me_ , she told herself. _Kreacher was bound to see them eventually, and he already thinks I'm about as useful as pond scum. It's not as if his opinion can get any lower._

Elara returned to her seat and trimmed the quill, tidying the desk before she wrote out another brief letter to Harriet and tucked it into an envelope. She had her own gift meant for Harriet's birthday, of course, and she found it before putting the velvet pouch into her pocket with Hermione's, then rather than setting out for the kitchen where Cygnus would be resting, she made for the stairs to go to the library on the second floor.

The Black library was no misnomer; dubious Charms expanded the space far beyond what the walls should have constrained, making it a maze of dark shelves towering in the dimly lit space, crowded with more books than one could ever possibly read in their lifetime, or so it felt like to Elara. Hermione would've squealed with delight upon seeing a room like it. Elara, though she liked books and reading, found it was a bit too…eerie.

She turned the lever for the gas lamps and waited for the wan light to brighten, sniffling on the untold decades worth of dust and dirt as the shelves came into view. There were no windows, as the sunlight could damage most of the older volumes, and several of the upper rows Cygnus had told Elara specifically not to touch. The books _whispered_ to one another, exchanging secrets, quieting only when Elara walked down their rows.

Squinting at the bindings, she wished she could use her wand and took a volume off the shelf to hold it closer to the light.

"What are you doing, girl?"

Elara flinched and almost dropped the book. Above the empty hearth, the portrait of a clever wizard with thin brows and a pointed beard watched as she clutched one hand to her chest and tried to slow her racing heart.

"I'd appreciate it if you didn't purposefully startle me."

The portrait scoffed. "Perhaps you should pay better attention to your surroundings."

Ignoring him, she popped open the book to a random page and squinted.

"Interested in animal husbandry, are you?"

Elara's gaze jerked itself back to the portrait. "What?"

The wizard smirked. "Well, considering you're perusing an eighteenth-century collection on Charms concerning the best ways to breed livestock, I thought you might have a passing interest in the subject."

Elara turned a page and, upon seeing a rather _detailed_ sketch, realized she did indeed have a book on animal husbandry in her hands and snapped it shut with an embarrassed grunt.

"Now, because I so _dearly_ love listening to my own voice, I'll ask again; _what are you looking for, girl_? I've had precious little to do in here but look at the bindings since my great-grandson thought to move me from the bedroom. I know where everything is."

Elara desperately wanted to snap that hanging in a bedroom shouldn't prove more exciting than hanging in a library but shut her mouth and swallowed the words. "I'm looking for a locater Charm, of sorts, for a letter. Something either I could cast or could ask to be cast at the postal office in Diagon Alley."

"Why?"

"To locate someone, of course."

The portrait gifted her an unamused look before jerking his chin in the direction of the southern wall. "Look there. Between the curio cabinet and the shelf bearing the Black crest. The collection of communication magic and indexes should still be there."

"Thank you."

Elara went to the bookcase in question and began scanning the heavy tomes. She had to pull most off the shelf and check one by one as few actually had titles printed on the binding, and most proved to be outdated editions on owl care. She did learn a great deal about how magical owls first came to be bred and used—apparently, the early wizards thought to breed eagles, and that ended with a few too many missing fingers—but Elara pushed on and searched more.

After dragging a particularly fat volume down, another, smaller book stuffed between its pages slipped out and hit the dusty floor. Elara frowned at it and picked the book up after setting the other one down, running her fingers over the leather cover stained a deep emerald, the silver snake gilt starting to flake about the edges.

"Golly, wonder if this belonged to a Slytherin," Elara said with a soft snort as she thumbed through the yellowing pages. The diagrams inside _were_ not about owls or their migration patterns; Elara caught glimpses of moving models demonstrating harsh, slashing hexes and something called " _Fire of the Fiend,_ " strange, distorting animals bursting from the characters' wands in rolling swirls.

Elara stuffed the book into her roomy pocket and returned to the shelf. She eventually found what she was looking for, a simple Charm placed upon a letter that made it easier for the owl to find recipients traveling or moving abroad, and Elara copied the spell down on a piece of parchment before returning the volume to its proper place. She headed down to the kitchen.

Once there, Elara shrugged on the outer robes she'd hung by the hearth and straightened her skirt, then beckoned Cygnus over to her. "Kreacher?" she called as the owl settled on the crook of her arm. "Kreacher, I'm stepping out for a few minutes, and I—."

A small jar sat on the otherwise empty table and caught Elara's attention. It was an innocuous thing, really, and yet it hadn't been there when she'd come down for lunch earlier, so Elara paused in her preparation to depart and picked the jar up. Like much of the house, dust coated the glass and the label was so faded the letters were almost illegible, but Elara managed to read, " _Derma-Bond. For scars_."

Elara stood, frozen, and stared at the jar without a word. The house-elf came sneaking into the kitchen through the slim door that led to the boiler room and sneered when Elara caught his eye.

"Thank you, Kreacher," she said with a small, stiff smile.

"Kreacher doesn't know what the blood-traitor's daughter is talking about."

"No, of course not." She stowed the jar away in her robes, given that her skirt pockets were already stuffed with letters and presents, an extra pair of gloves and the book out of the library. "I'll be back soon."

Kreacher sniffed and dragged himself back into the hot boiler room. Elara turned with Cygnus to the hearth and scooped a pinch of Floo Powder out of the silver jar on the mantel. Tossing it into the dying fire, she said, "Diagon Alley!" and disappeared in a whirl of soot and green fire.


	42. home is nowhere

**_xlii. home is nowhere_**

In the southern parts of Oxfordshire, in between here and there, at a crossroads that didn't lead anywhere in particular, sat a bespectacled witch on an antique trunk and a large serpent lazing in a bed of bluebells.

Harriet Potter turned the crumpled map in her hands and squinted at the lettering, the paper made too bright by the cheery sunshine and the writing refusing to cooperate. She had little experience with mundane maps let alone _magical_ ones, and this map did everything it could to confound the frustrated girl. She turned it again and huffed.

"Set?"

At her feet, the shadows peeled away from the thick patches splayed between the grass and bluebells to form a vague question mark shape.

"Could you—?"

The shadow lifted itself from the dirt like rain in reverse, coming together to form a nebulous umbrella of watery darkness hanging above the girl's bent head.

"Excellent, cheers," Harriet said as she went back to the map.

When term came to an end and Harriet arrived in London a month prior, she made no attempt to return to her relatives in Little Whinging. No, she had no desire to see Aunt Petunia, Uncle Vernon, or her cousin Dudley ever again, and she guessed they were be pleased to be shut of her anyway. Rather, Harriet disembarked from the Hogwarts Express and—at Set's prompting—returned to Diagon Alley.

At first, Harriet rather enjoyed her stay in the Alley. She ate lunch at Florean Fortescue's or Pofferton's Puddings on Toad Road, explored the many nooks and crannies of the varied shops, and fell asleep in her bed at the Leaky Cauldron. Diagon Alley and its adjoining streets comprised the biggest magical district in England—but the Wizarding community was really rather small, and it had a very long memory. While everyone didn't actually _know_ everyone else, they at least knew _of_ each other, or their families, or had a mate who knew someone who knew them. Anonymity was not really a thing for wizards and witches.

Tom, the landlord for the Leaky Cauldron, remembered Harriet from last summer—as did housekeeping, Florean Fortescue and quite a few of the shop owners about the district. She ran into Professor Sinistra once in the pub and had to dive behind a cart to avoid being seen by Professor Snape as he came out of the Apothecary. The manager at Flourish and Blotts always frowned when Harriet passed by his shop. They started to ask…questions, questions about why a scruffy kid was always out and about on her own without her guardians, and she soon began to worry they might write to the magical equivalent of child services. Harriet never wanted to be trapped with people like the Dursleys again.

So, she stayed two nights at the Leaky Cauldron, a third at the Niffler's Nest in Horizont Alley, a fourth at the Hopping Pot down Carkitt Market, and afterward Harriet visited Globus Mundi Travel Agents to buy a map of Britain's Wizarding settlements and scrounged up an old, Charmed tent in The Junk Shop. Diagon Alley may have been the largest magical district in England—but it was not the only one.

From there, Harriet set out on an arduous journey of Floo hopping from Diagon Alley to the smaller district of The Cobbled Lane in Blackburn, then on to the Tarland Tavern in Edinburgh, where Harriet exhausted herself and had to spend the night. She'd thought traveling through the Floo Network would be a simple thing, but apparently a body as small as hers was subject to magical exhaustion, as the distance flickering between Floo to Floo to Floo took its toll. Harriet could barely keep her eyes open as she promised the witch behind the bar that her parents would be along later that evening, and she snuck out before dawn.

Afterward, Harriet spent one week on the Isle of Skye, camping in the fens and rolling hills and rocky tors, not far from the village of Giant's Rest near The Storr. The area was populated by some of the barmiest wizards Harriet had ever met, including a batty potioneer named Ernestine Elderberry, who claimed to be three hundred and fourteen years old and brewed with spit from the fairies she'd met near the Bruach na Frithe. The woman shoved a glass cauldron full of curious, light blue crystals into Harriet's arms one day—said it was a gift—then went off chasing a flying sheep toward the mountains. The crystals glowed softly whenever Harriet spoke in Parseltongue, and she had no clue what to make of that.

Harriet stayed another week at Elva Hill in Cumbria, where a night market popped into existence every evening after nightfall and one could buy all manner of strange local flora—though not with Galleons. The shopkeepers didn't look, well, _human_ to Harriet, what with their glowing eyes and sharp ears, and they bartered with puzzling things like a sigh captured in a bottle, or a name, or two hops, or a joke. The stalls would appear in the shadow of the hill itself as the sun dipped into the horizon, and Harriet saw vampires there, and goblins and green-skinned hags, wizards with teeth like wolves, Centaurs and beautiful, white-haired women who the wizards chased after like hungry dogs.

After midnight, she could sometimes see distant lights outside her tent's walls, and sometimes she heard whispers asking her to come out and play and dance. Fortunately for Harriet, she was adept at ignoring cajoling little voices, and so she stayed cozy in her bed.

Now Harriet sat at the side of a road leading nowhere at all, in front of a sign with no directions, with hot sunshine pounding on the top of her head and Kevin, her snake-golem, coiled in her hair. A wizard at the Hopping Pot tavern with a beard longer than Dumbledore's had—in a thick, rambling brogue—told her about the Wizarding hamlet of Bantiaumyrddin, which was supposed to be somewhere in Oxfordshire, but Harriet was beginning to think that the old wizard had been a nutter.

Chewing her lip, she pulled her wand out of its brace and rapped the map. "Bantiaumyrddin!"

The ink swirled, searching, and hazy patterns of the path she'd trod appeared, but the way forward remained foggy. Little question marks blossomed from Harriet's stick figure like anxious sweat.

"Probably saying it wrong," Harriet grumbled as she stashed her wand away again and folded the map. Hermione would've pronounced it correctly, and Harriet wished she was there with her. "Sounds bloody Welsh anyway. Barmy wizard…."

Sighing, Harriet slipped off her trunk and laid in the cooler grass, shifting until a wispy tree branch blocked the sun from hitting her eyes. Livi stirred from his nap to investigate.

" _Sss…do you know the way?_ " he asked as his tongue flicked and smelled the air, Kevin mirroring the move against Harriet's damp temple.

" _No, I'm not sure,_ " she replied. Harriet took a Chocolate Frog out of her shorts' pocket, and though it resembled a melted lump more than an actual frog, she popped it into her mouth and chewed, flipping the card over for her inspection. "Dumbledore again."

" _When do we return to the ssstone placcce?_ "

" _Hogwarts? Not for a while._ "

The Horned Serpent hissed as he slithered through the plants and over Harriet's torso, raising himself so his snout hovered close to her face and Harriet blinked. His eyes burned a luminescent blue, black scales hot to the touch, the gem upon the ridge of his brow glittering in the sunshine. " _Exxxplain_."

" _We don't go back until it's time for school_."

" _Why not now?_ "

" _Because school doesn't start until September. We've been over this, you know._ "

Livi hissed and twitched as he did whenever Harriet tried to explain something he wasn't familiar with. Snakes didn't have much comprehension of _school—_ or _time_ , for that matter, since Livi referred to winter as "the cold time" and summer as "the warm time" with little distinction in between. He ate, slept, and drank as he pleased, be it day or night. " _Humansss are ssstupid_ ," he said, remorseless and uncaring of Harriet's scandalized expression. " _Wasssteful. We ssshould ssstay at the ssstone placcce. The air…._ " The serpent paused and sent his violet tongue flickering once more. " _The air isss besst there._ "

Harriet took that to mean he liked the magic at Hogwarts, since Livi didn't much approve of the Muggle places they passed through. They smelled "wrong" to him.

She didn't reply. Harriet went to stroke his scales and Livi reared back to inspect her hand, licking the smudges of chocolate from her fingertips. Truth be told, Harriet very much wished they could stay at Hogwarts year round too—but, unlike her classmates, she lacked anywhere else to go, so she supposed everyone else would be a bit peeved if they were stuck at the castle all the time.

Lost in thought, Harriet didn't spot the pair of owls descending on her until Livi hissed a warning, and she had barely enough time to sit up before Elara's bird, Cygnus, landed on her head. Kevin let out a sound of fear and she quickly tucked him down the front of her blouse before surly Cygnus decided to eat him. The other post-carrier—a spotted barn owl Harriet didn't recognize—landed a polite distance away, leg extended for her to accept the attached package.

"Ouch, Cygnus, geroff—."

The black owl pecked at Harriet's raised hand, then fluttered down to her knee, giving both Harriet and Livi an imperious look that dared them to object. The witch huffed as she rubbed her sore hand.

"And what's your problem, you daft bird? That hurt."

Cygnus hooted, louder than before, and held out his leg like the other owl did. Nervous of having her fingers nipped to ribbons, Harriet hesitated before loosening the twine binding the small package in place, but once it dropped, Cygnus took to the air without a backward glance, cuffing Harriet in the head for her efforts. The barn owl acted with better manners and stuck around for Harriet to give him a piece of a Licorice Wand from her pocket.

"What's this?" Harriet wondered aloud as she opened the lumpy envelope from Elara. Two folded letters fell out, as did two parcels carefully wrapped in plain parchment and spare bits of ribbon. She unfolded the first letter, and grinned as she recognized Hermione's tidy handwriting. The bushy-haired witch went on at some length about the summer Defense assignment and even included a list of book references Harriet might want to include in her Charms essay, having correctly surmised the bespectacled witch hadn't finished all her assignments yet. The letter concluded with—

 _Happy birthday, Harriet. I do hope you like your present. I Transfigured it from a bit of silver I liberated from the Malfoys. Stolen silver is the only kind of metal that can hold the Honor Among Thieves Charm—which makes it so items in your possession cannot be Summoned from you. Your wand, for example. I do hope it's not needed, but it never hurts to be prepared. Stay safe, and don't go looking for trouble!_

 _Love, Hermione._

"Oh," Harriet said, blinking. It was her birthday? She'd forgotten all about it, which wasn't surprising, given that Harriet had never had a birthday before she much looked forward to, last year's being the best in her memory. She opened up the parcel and found a thin, gleaming bangle with the adjustable ends shaped like a snake eating its own tail. The design was rather crude, but Harriet loved it and quickly snapped the bracelet into place on her wrist. "Lovely."

Grinning, she opened Elara's gift—and out tumbled a small white teaspoon attached to a long strip of leather. The handle was riddled in tiny runes and inscriptions, and the top bore a familiar crest of a skull and three black birds. Harriet turned the spoon over in her hand, puzzled, then checked Elara's letter.

 _Harriet—_

 _I hope this letter finds you. I've had trouble sending the last few, and Cygnus has been put out that he hasn't been able to deliver._

"That would explain the biting," Harriet grumbled, reading on.

 _I've enclosed your birthday gift, along with Hermione's, who wished for me to send hers on. Mine is a bit odd, but I think you'll appreciate it. My ancestors proved to be a pack of highly paranoid individuals, most of them convinced the house-elves were out to get them. To that end, I think it was our great-great aunt Cassiopeia who paid the Bavarians to carve a set of cutlery from the bones of Erklings. However they came about, the set's Charmed to be self-cleaning and turns black in the presence of most known poisons._

Harriet studied at the strange spoon with new consideration. The misadventure with the poisoned tea last term had greatly turned Harriet off the food in the Great Hall, so it would be nice to have a smidgen of reassurance if she was worried. Harriet guessed both Elara and Hermione were still concerned about her if this was what they'd decided to get her for her birthday.

Kevin hissed as she looped the leather about her neck and dropped the spoon down her shirt before she kept reading.

 _I would like it if you came to stay with me for the rest of summer. If you want. Livius is welcome, too. I live at 12 Grimmauld Place, London—the Borough of Islington, to be precise. It's imperative to remember the address, or it's quite tricky to find._

 _Hoping to see you soon,_

 _Elara._

"Excellent," Harriet said, grinning ear to ear. Livi began to nose the parchment, clearly wishing to know what had pleased her, so she told him, " _Elara has invited us to come stay with her._ "

" _At the ssstone placcce?_ "

" _No, not Hogwarts. At her home. I've not been there before._ "

Displeased, Livi moved away, receding into the bluebells with a final utterance of " _Fine_." The Horned Serpent disliked when plans didn't coincide with his whims and had no problem letting Harriet know that, so she ignored him and opened her final gift, this one from Hogwarts' groundskeeper, Hagrid. Inside the torn paper she found a wood flute that appeared hand-carved, and when Harriet blew on the end, it emitted a loud hoot like an owl. She would have to send the half-giant a thank you note.

Harriet laid again in the flowers and folded her hands over her letters, holding them against her chest, as she gazed at the summer sky. A little over a year ago, Harriet knew nothing at all of magic; she had no friends, no prospects. She lived in a cupboard and served her relatives, always terrified the next time Uncle Vernon yelled, he'd start strangling her and wouldn't let go. One year ago, she traveled into the magical world and met Elara, and Livius. Hogwarts sometimes seemed a very distant dream, but now, in her hands, she held proof of the friendships she'd made, letters signed with " _love_ ," and " _hoping to see you soon_ ," and a " _dear Harry"_ from Hagrid. People cared about strange, orphan Harriet Potter, and she didn't know if she'd ever get used to it.

"Number Twelve, Grimmauld Place," she repeated aloud. Her shadow lay still at her side, and Harriet half-fancied Set had his arms crossed over his middle and was staring at the sky, too. If shadows could do such a thing. "We'll camp out here tonight, then, and set off for London in the morning. I wonder if Elara has a telly?"

She shut her eyes and soaked in the sunshine.

 **A/N: I hope you enjoyed a glimpse into my world-building for the UK magical community! As for magical traveling, I've considered what their limitations would be, and I believe that 1) a portkey is an object connecting one space to another via a wizard/witch's magic. The object thus absorbs the impact from the distance and uses the magic it stores as the inertia for travel. I consider this to be one of the reasons why they're illegal to create, because I'd say only powerful magical folks would be able to successfully create them. 2) In Floo traveling, the traveler is subjected to extreme velocity and pressure for a duration of time, that time being longer the farther you have to "flit" through the network. 3) Apparition is powered by an individual's magic. The more powerful you are, the farther you can propel yourself through time and space without your being disintegrating—aka, splinching. Sorry for the long note!**


	43. the house of malfoy

_**xliii. the house of malfoy**_

Dread filled Hermione's veins when she heard the approaching _tap, tap, tap_ of his walking stick striking the floor.

It was such a pretentious thing, Hermione thought, his need to strut about with a walking stick like he was the bloody king of England himself. Or one of those white-feathered peacocks on the grounds. She often daydreamed about taking the blasted thing in her hands and cracking it in two over her knee, though these daydreams never moved past the act itself—never included the consequences such a move would reap. There _would_ be consequences, too. Hermione guessed she probably wouldn't survive breaking Lucius Malfoy's concealed wand into pieces.

Across from her, Jamie Ingham, the Malfoys' older Muggle-born ward, heard the same tapping as Hermione and quickly straightened in his chair as he flipped through the text before him and lowered his head. Draco, at the head of the polished table, either didn't hear his father coming or didn't care, because he continued to slouch and play with the miniature broom in his hand, sending it sailing around paper obstacles, his school books forgotten on the side.

Mr. Malfoy entered the dining room through the far archway, dressed in his usual Wizarding garb, robes black and his vest royal purple with gleaming, golden buttons. He looked quite prim— _puffed up and stuffy_ , Hermione's mind provided in a voice that sounded suspiciously like Elara Black—and as she watched him through her lashes, she saw his mouth curl into a sneer.

"Draco," he barked, startling the pointy-faced boy. "Sit _up_."

The younger Malfoy did as told, his cheeks flushed pink, and Hermione fought down her satisfied smirk. She must have not been as discreet as she thought, because Mr. Malfoy rounded on her and extended one long-fingered hand, waiting for Hermione to glance up and meet his unimpressed glower. "Your work, Miss Granger."

Hermione gave him her incomplete essay on Dr. Ubbly's Oblivious Unction, and Malfoy skimmed the topic, tutting under his breath.

"Pedantic at best. A shallow analysis reflective of a shallow mind. My, my. I must write the school and ensure you really _are_ the best student of your year. I find that highly suspicious."

Color invaded Hermione's cheeks, but she didn't tear up. Draco snickered—and Mr. Malfoy rounded on him now, his cane striking the table with a heavy _thump_ that caused all three students to jump. "If you've time to laugh, Draco, you've time to better your own assignment. I seem to recall you were _sixth_ in your year, boy."

Draco paled and shrank as he fidgeted with his books, not quite meeting Mr. Malfoy's eye. "Yes, father. But it's not my fault!" he grumbled. "Two of them were Ravenclaws! And Nott. He's such a bookworm. And—." He glared at Hermione. "Granger and Black cheated."

Mr. Malfoy scoffed, a noise as pompous as his own appearance. Jaime sank farther into his chair like he wanted to disappear into it, and Hermione wondered what his rank had been. "Granger is a Muggle-born, and Black is a ridiculous, thoughtless girl who has little regard for the time and effort of others," he spat, his tone as vicious as it ever was when Elara came up in conversation. That one of her best friends could hassle and aggrieve Malfoy so much when Hermione couldn't brought her private joy. "That you could be so easily surpassed by either shows your lack of conviction. If you don't prove yourself more capable, Draco, I will rethink my _offer_."

Draco instantly pulled his books closer, both horrified and elated, a look Hermione couldn't rightly understand. She looked to Jaime for assistance, but he hadn't lifted his head from his work and pointedly refused to acknowledge all of her friendly overtures. They'd exchanged a handful of greetings over the summer, half-heard grunts or vague, distrustful looks on Jaime's part that Hermione didn't understand—just as she didn't understand Draco's suddenly smug mood.

Sometimes, she wished Elara hadn't been emancipated, that she'd come to stay at the Malfoys as well so Hermione wouldn't be stuck alone for weeks on end. Elara—pure-blooded and proxy to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black—could've stood up to Mr. Malfoy, unlike Hermione. Draco's father never struck her or mistreated her of course, but…the revulsion became unbearable after a time.

Mr. Malfoy strutted—for it could _not_ be called walking—out of the room again after verbally tearing Jaime's work to shreds, leaving the trio to study in peace. Draco shoved off the task once more with a broad grin.

"What has you so pleased?" Hermione demanded. "You've done nothing all summer but smirk and gloat, Malfoy. It's insufferable."

The blond boy lifted a brow and gave a smug, faux laugh Hermione had heard him practicing in his room before. "Oh, father's promised me a gift is all, Granger. You see, next year I'm going to be on the Quidditch team, and father's promised to buy the whole team new brooms." Malfoy studied his nails. "He's quite generous."

"You're not on the team," she replied, frowning. "Try-outs don't take place until the new school year." Really, Hermione had very little interest in Quidditch or any sport; she knew try-outs hadn't occurred yet because Harriet was looking forward to them. Attending Quidditch practice would cut into Harriet's study time, but Hermione thought the rambunctious witch would actually benefit from the exercise. She usually spent an hour of their free period pacing around the table in the library and would only sit when Hermione—or Madam Pince—snapped at her.

Malfoy scoffed and retrieved the toy broom from his pocket where he'd hid it from his father. "Don't be stupid, Mudblood."

" _Don't_ call me that."

He mouthed the word again, and it took everything in Hermione not to hurl a tome at his fat head. The book didn't deserve that.

Mr. Malfoy returned soon enough with Mrs. Malfoy and the trio of students stowed their books and assignments in their bags to prepare for lunch. Draco relinquished the head of the table to his father and sneered as he sank into a seat by Hermione.

"Draco, don't make rude faces," his mother reprimanded.

"Yes, mother."

Mr. Malfoy leaned his walking stick against the table's edge as he took his seat and cleared his throat. "Dobby!"

A crack preceded the appearance of the stooped, green-skinned house-elf in his tattered pillowcase. "You called for Dobby, Master Malfoy sir?"

"Serve lunch."

Dobby disappeared again, and a few moments later he came tottering out of the adjoining kitchen bearing several plates of fresh salad, scones, cream, and jam. Hermione resisted the urge to reach out and assist the short creature as he passed her chair, bowls balanced on his head, his motions quick as he slid dishes before Mr. and Mrs. Malfoy, their son, then Jaime and Hermione. She'd tried to help before and had been promptly chastised.

"How was the Minister today, father?" Draco asked as Dobby poured tea. Again Hermione had to stop herself from offering thanks or gratitude.

"Minister Gaunt is well," Mr. Malfoy answered. "And busy, of course. He has little time for idle pleasantries, though he sends his greetings to you and Narcissa." He speared a water chestnut and placed it in his mouth, chewing thoroughly before continuing. "He assures me you will have a…most interesting term at Hogwarts this year."

 _What does he mean by that?_

Hermione looked up and caught Jaime's eye, and though the older boy quickly looked away, they did share a single moment of disquiet at the pleased tenor in Mr. Malfoy's voice. Draco didn't notice and happily went about eating his food and taking a deep swig of pumpkin juice. "Really? How so, father?"

"Now, now, Draco. You don't want to ruin the surprise, do you?"

Just then, a saucer slipped through Dobby's spindly fingers and cracked in two upon the floor. Mr. Malfoy reacted without a word; the cane found itself in the wizard's hand once more and lashed out, striking Dobby's head, earning a squeal out of the poor creature and a sharp gasp from Hermione. Dobby cowered, cupping the the bleeding cut above his drooping ear, and Mr. Malfoy glared as he dropped the walking stick back into place.

"Clean it _up,_ " he spat.

Dobby snapped his trembling fingers and the saucer floated upward to the table after repairing itself. Hermione could feel her hands shaking, so she dropped them into her lap, balling them into fists as she stifled the need to shout and rail. She hated this. In any other circumstance, Hermione would have told Mr. Malfoy precisely what she thought of him and his heavy-handed ways—but Hermione couldn't insult him, couldn't give him a piece of her mind, because if Mr. Malfoy chose to do so, he could rescind his wardship and she would be forced back to the Muggle world. The Ministry would snap her wand. She would never see Hogwarts again.

It wasn't right—but what could Hermione do? She was a not quite thirteen-year-old witch with no autonomy in this society, no voice. She had to be practical and cunning, not bold and brash like a Gryffindor. Intervening with no plan of action would only reap consequences for Dobby and herself, and the last thing Hermione wanted to do was make life harder for the house-elves living at the manor. Quite frankly, she feared the end of Mr. Malfoy's cane as much as the servants— _slaves_ —did.

Mrs. Malfoy noticed how pale the children had gone, including Draco, who hunched his shoulders and stared at his plate, not meeting his mother's eye. "Lucius," she reprimanded. "What have we said about punishing the servants at the table?"

Her husband's pale eyes narrowed at the rebuff, but Mr. Malfoy simpered and nodded. "Of course, my dear. Quite unseemly of me."

Lunch continued without conversation. Dobby shuffled back into the kitchen, muttering about being a "bad elf," and Hermione ate little of the provided food, her stomach too twisted into knots for her to force anything more than a few mouthfuls down. Mr. Malfoy excused himself first, and after Dipthy—another Malfoy elf—scuttled through and cleared the meal's remnants, Mrs. Malfoy set about lecturing them in manners and Wizarding history. Hermione kept her head down for the lesson's duration.

She could do nothing. She wasn't powerful or connected, didn't have the right name like Elara, or six feet of venomous serpent stuffed beneath her shirt like Harriet—but inaction had never sat well with Hermione. She wanted to change how things were, both for house-elves and Muggle-borns, because she knew some Muggle-borns in different families were treated just as poorly as Dobby. Hermione may have been powerless, and yet she refused to give in; one day she'd be able to tell wizards like Mr. Malfoy off. One day she'd be able to stand up and say, " _That's enough!_ "

Later, the house-elves would find a little packet of Muggle ointments and first-aid items outside their pantry door, and Hermione would say nothing at all when she saw Dobby running about with pink and blue plasters stuck to his bruised head. She'd say nothing, but the sight would only further solidify her resolve.


	44. an uninvited guest

**_xliv. an uninvited guest_**

Harriet looked down into the cauldron of foul smelling glop and wrinkled her nose.

"Er…." Sitting back on her haunches, she flipped through the open Potions book and fussed with her rolled sleeves. " _I don't…I don't think I did this right_."

A low, disinterested hiss emanating from beneath the bed answered her.

" _Oh, wait, it's supposed to smell like that?_ " Harriet traced a line in the text and squinted. " _Urgh. It says it's supposed to be 'golden in hue,' but mine's more like spring grass…wait it's darkening now…I guess it's not done?_ " Harriet peaked over the cauldron's rim again, frowning. Sure enough, the green steadily leached from the thick liquid and became mustard yellow. " _Snape stupid summer assignments are just as hard as the rubbish he gives us in class_."

The Girding Potion released a noxious smelling puff and Harriet recoiled, reaching for her mittens to lift the little cauldron onto the cooling rack, hoping yellow was a close enough color for Snape's discerning criticism. She sat in the middle of her tent's floor surrounded by open potion ingredients and a few wayward snack wrappers, a roll of parchment and a quill set to the side where she'd been writing her homework while the potion heated in its various stages. Livi had long since grown bored of watching Harriet and had retreated to his favorite hiding spot, though Kevin remained in her old shirt's breast pocket. Sometimes the golem-snake repeated what Harriet said, and she decided that made him a much better listener than Livi at the moment.

A cool breeze ruffled the magical tent's wall, making the seemingly solid interior ripple. The lantern sputtered and, after discarding her mittens, Harriet groaned, got to her feet, and wandered over to it. She tapped the lantern's brass base. " _I think Muggles had the right thinking with electricity_."

" _What isss…electricccity?_ "

" _It's like…lightning in wires, in the walls, and it makes lights come on._ "

Livi poked his nose out from beneath the bed's wobbly frame. " _Thisss…sssoundss foolissh._ "

" _Well, Muggles understand it well enough. I can't explain it like they could._ " The lantern sputtered a final time and went out. Harriet stumbled about in the dark until she found the Self-Lighting candles that she needed only to touch for the wicks to flicker into life. " _In Hogwarts: A History, it talks about how magic and electricity and—and certain radio waves don't mix? I can't remember what it said exactly…but magic's like a second conduit or something, and it makes stuff inert or unstable. I can't help but be jealous of my Aunt Petunia just being able to flick a bloody switch sometimes. For adults it's not so bad I guess, because they can use spells. I hate being underage_."

" _Sss_ …." The serpent contemplated Harriet as she poked about her trunk in search of an oil globe she could insert into the bottom of the Charmed lantern. Dr. Filibuster's Fireworks on Carkitt Market had an Ever-burning Oil variant that would have solved Harriet's problem, but they wouldn't sell it to her, because—as a minor—she couldn't put the fire out if she spilled the oil by accident. Harriet knew they were simply being logical, though she still wished for light-bulbs sometimes.

" _Magic…isss not meant to be…easssy_."

Livi retreated beneath the bed again, and Harriet puzzled over what he'd said. _Magic is not meant to be easy_. It certainly wasn't what Harriet would call _easy_ , not now, at least. When she'd first discovered her heritage, she'd been under the mistaken impression that one could cast spells by flicking around their wand and mumbling funny words—and then she took one look at the diagrams inside her Transfiguration textbook and that theory imploded in her face.

Magic was _difficult_ , and finicky, and wondrous and—at times—terrifying. Hermione once mentioned to Harriet that everything in nature had a balance, and perhaps the balance for witches and wizards who could turn desks into elephants or fly on broomsticks was forsaking things not made from magic or their own hands. Perhaps if you could flick a wand and create light from nothing, you didn't deserve light-bulbs.

Harriet, lost in thought, watched the candles burn and didn't hear when the crickets went quiet.

A sudden chime echoed from beneath the bed. Harriet started.

"Livi?"

The chime came again—and suddenly the Charmed flap over the tent's entrance was carelessly torn aside, and Harriet found herself staring down the lit side of a brandished wand.

A wizard stood in her tent, dressed in navy robes that, given the relatively plain cut and the insignia stitched onto the front pocket, must've been a uniform of some kind. The wide brim of his hat hid his eyes from Harriet, but she could still see his grim, self-satisfied smile, the black hair on his upper lip, and the nostrils left bloodless as they flared in anger.

"Finally—there you are, you little shit," he said in a biting Northern accent. "Been all over Hell's half acre looking for your stupid arse."

"Looking for—?" Harriet could do little more than gawk at the man—the _intruder—_ who'd stomped into her tent in the middle of bloody nowhere and now held her at wand-point.

"Looking for _you_ , bloody half-blood hiding in the fucking woods. No one said anything about that—."

"I don't know who you are!"

"I'm not here to answer your questions!" He took a breath and seemed to gather himself, the irritation festering behind a composed mask as he soothed his mussed hair. His wand never wavered. "Come along, Miss Potter, I've been sent to…collect you."

The chime came again and though the man ignored it, Harriet realized the sound came from her snake. Livi had made the same sound in the loo at Hogwarts before the troll came stampeding through.

"I'm—I'm not going anywhere with you!" Harriet knew she could be a bit naive and foolish at times, but she absolutely refused to leave with a strange wizard who came barging into her sanctuary in the dead of night. That was just common sense.

What wasn't common sense was forgetting to strap her wand to her wrist that morning. She'd grown careless gallivanting on her own, as the leather brace grew uncomfortable and sticky in the hot summer sun while Harriet wandered—and she couldn't _use_ the blasted thing while out of school, so she hadn't seen the harm in leaving both the wand and the brace on the rumpled bed.

She saw the harm now.

"You'll be going where I tell you, Potter. My Lord's not keen on waiting long—."

Harriet's eyes flicked toward her wand and she knew he saw the motion, because his mouth opened to incant a spell and his own wand rose.

"Now, now…don't be difficult, kid…."

She dove to the side just as a burst of red light came zooming at her, and though Harriet managed to dodge, the spell grazed her arm and she landed on the floor, gasping. It felt as if she'd been slugged in the stomach and kicked in the head, simultaneously breathless and dazed and more than a little confused with her glasses askew and one arm limp against her side.

The man approached, a new hex ready—and Set lurched from beneath Harriet, a single column of black darting out to strike the candles and douse the tent in darkness.

"What the _fuck_ —?!"

A single hiss was all the warning the wizard received before Livi bolted from beneath the bed and Harriet felt warm scales rippling against her cheek as the wizard shrieked. He only got out one terrified cry and a half-formed spell that splattered on the canvas wall before his body fell, a heavy thud sounding in the sticky dark.

Harriet's strangled breaths broke the renewed silence.

"Li— _Livius_?" The spell's fuzzy remnants finally dissipated and allowed Harriet to sit up, though she very much dreaded what she'd find. Her hand trembled as it slid along the serpent's body until—.

Until she found a foot. An unmoving foot attached to an unmoving leg.

"Oh God—Merlin, sweet Salazar Slytherin's saintly left _bollock_ —!"

The serpent's coils shifted, and Harriet smelled copper, Livi's tongue flicking against her cheek. " _Misstresss_."

Harriet staggered under his weight as she leapt upright and dashed to the candles, setting them alight one by one. The light only served to illuminate what she already knew; the wizard laid flat on his back like a dead beetle, black tongue lolling out of his open mouth, blood smudged about his upper thigh where The Horned Serpent had only needed to bite once.

 _Livi killed him like the troll._

Sick crawled up Harriet's throat and she vomited on the floor.

" _Misstresss?_ "

Wiping her mouth, Harriet reached out to touch Livi's head, her fingers shaking so hard they skipped over his horns and along his scales. "I'm— _I'm okay—_."

The wizard just stared at the ceiling.

 _Dead. Dead, he's dead—_.

Harriet's familiar had killed a man, a man intent on kidnapping her, but a person nonetheless. He hadn't said who he was or what he wanted, only that he was going to take Harriet with him whether she wanted him to or not. Livi had been protecting her—but would the Ministry see it like that? She knew their policemen were called _Aurors_ because her dad had been one, so Harriet wondered if they'd send Aurors after her. They'd kick her out of Hogwarts. They'd take her to jail. They'd _kill_ Livi.

Her heart raced in her chest.

Who was he? Why—where did he want to take me? She thought about Quirrell and the red spell he'd slung at her in the dungeons, the Mirror of Erised and the unrivaled horror of facing her own mortality as Voldemort shrieked for her death.

 _"I will let you share in that eternal life, Harriet…. You and your family could live forever…."_

Shaking, Harriet straightened her glasses and tried to control her breathing. She couldn't look away from the wizard.

 _What if he wasn't alone? What if there's more?_

As soon as the terrible thought occurred to Harriet, she moved and dashed around her bed to snatch up her wand and brace.

 _I have to get away, I can't stay here, I can't—_.

Harriet kicked open the top of her trunk and snatched the Invisibility Cloak off the top of the jumbled interior. She was fortunate the purse she kept her exchanged Muggle money in fell out too, or Harriet would've sprinted off into the dark without a pound or a Knut on her person. Her fear thundered in her head until it seemed to echo, drowning every other thought out, a repetitive beat of _go, go, go_ thumping her thick skull.

"Livi, we need to leave—!"

She hefted one coil around her shoulders and the snake managed the rest, sensing the urgency in his witch's tone. Kevin stirred in her pocket and Harriet poked him further down as she strapped her wand into place and threw the Invisibility Cloak over her head.

 _What if there's more, what if—what if he meant to take me to Voldemort—!_

Harriet allowed herself one last look at the dead man before clutching Livi to her chest and running into the waiting night.

* * *

 **A/N: Which magical place would you be most interested in seeing in a future installment? Giant's Rest near The Storr? Or the Night Market near Elva Hill? I might include both at some point in the series, but I am curious!**


	45. penance for petunia

_**xlv. penance for petunia**_

When his arm started to burn, Severus wasn't surprised.

No, Severus was a man of routine and absolutes; the sun rose in the east, set in the west, fire was hot, ice was cold, and Harriet Potter would somehow, some way, wind up in imminent danger.

Before he'd known about the Vow chaining his life to the brat's, Severus had already come to expect the ever-present burning in the summertime. The searing and prickling always increased during the holidays, and for the longest time, Severus hadn't had a single idea _why_ that was. Now, however, he knew _why_ even if he wished he didn't, because Albus Dumbledore would never forgive him for killing Petunia Evans, even if the bitch was abusing her only niece.

Severus sat up from his slouched position in his armchair and the Potions journal he'd been reading when he dozed off slid to the rug. Air hissed through his clenched teeth as he tightened his hand around his wrist and lurched upright, sleep's muddled haze already disappearing, his body and mind trained to wake swiftly—though his heart raced and his footing was less than steady. He grabbed his cloak from the hook by his mantel and hesitated by the Floo.

He knew where he must go. Severus had made sure of that before term even ended; finding Potter's home address had been too easy for Severus' taste. _What if Slytherin had gone looking for it?_ He'd waited all summer for the opportunity to catch _Tuney_ or her fucking husband putting the girl in danger— _in flagrante_ , as it were. Perhaps it was wrong for Severus to have waited at all, for him to gamble with Potter's safety, but he was a Slytherin, not a bleeding-heart Gryffindor; he needed to bring evidence before Albus. The Headmaster could be incredibly thick-headed in these matters.

Abuse, be it against a child or a partner, wasn't common in the Wizarding world, not like it could be among Muggles. Oh, wizards had their own fair share of emotional neglect going on, but pure-bloods had trouble conceiving. When the whole weight of your family legacy rested on a hard-won child's shoulders, you didn't _beat_ that child, and you didn't beat your spouse when they were trained in curses and poisons and knew _exactly_ where you kept your bloody tea. Without evidence, Severus doubted Dumbledore could even _conceive_ of the idea that Petunia might hurt her niece.

Still, Severus hesitated. He hesitated because he feared he might not hold back if he witnessed Petunia hurting Lily's daughter.

"Fuck," he cursed when pain flared again. Severus took a pinch of Floo Powder and threw into the grate, snapping, "Number Eight, Wisteria Walk, Surrey!"

The fire blazed green and he braced himself for the dizzying, spiraling pressure of long-distance Floo travel. When he stepped out of the grate, he did so with a soft gasp, bringing in the smell cabbage and cats, the taste of soot heavy on his tongue and in his throat. A Kneazle perched on the back of a tatty couch growled at Severus, and he slipped his wand into his shaking hand.

The light flicked on, and he managed to not whirl about—though Severus did slowly raise his hands when confronted with an older woman wielding a Muggle handgun.

"Who're you then?" the old Squib demanded, dressed in a fluffy bathrobe with two cats at her feet. She squinted. "…Snape?"

"Madam Figg," he drawled, hoping the crazy bat didn't shoot him on accident. He knew Arabella Figg more by chance than anything else, a distant memory from a decade ago of passing in the Order headquarters, and she probably recognized him by notoriety. He'd been told by Albus years ago that the Headmaster had an agent in play near Privet Drive to watch over the girl, but Severus would've never guessed it was Arabella Figg until he searched the records for the nearest Floo contact to Potter's home. "I've received…intel that the Potter girl might be in danger and have come to verify her safety for myself."

The gun lowered, which irked Severus. Any Death Eater with half an ounce of brain power could buy or cook up a Polyjuice Potion and pretend to be him, but the woman did ask any identifying questions or for any of the old Order passwords. Instead, she appeared momentarily confused and scratched her face, a heavy frown deepening her wrinkles. "Danger? Shouldn't she be off in school?"

Severus lowered his hands and stiffened. "It is _August_ , Figg."

"August?" The woman had the temerity to look at him as if _Severus_ were the one out of his mind. "Oh, it is, isn't it? I remember now. I…I don't believe I've seen Harriet since last Christmas."

He stared. "What."

"When the Dursleys went on holiday. They always leave the dear behind, sweet girl…."

 _Sweet fucking Morgana, Albus. Did it ever occur to you to check that your nanny wasn't a few beans short of every flavor?_

His wrist ached. Severus didn't have time for coddling nattering Squibs in the middle of the night, and so he swept around, whacked himself on the head with his wand to cast a Disillusionment Charm, and strode out into the muggy heat. He stumbled when he got his first look at the street, though he would've cursed any witnesses to his dumbfounded expression blind before admitting how the sight staggered him. Severus came from the back-end of Cokeworth, where the houses lined up like soot-stained gravestones in the shadow of the old mill, and yet he couldn't have prepared himself for the distinctly _Muggle_ reality of Little Whinging.

Oh, yes, he could imagine _Tuney_ living quite happily in one of these uniform homes with their uniform gardens and plain, ugly letterboxes. Tobias Snape used to watch reruns of _The Twilight Zone_ on the telly when he wasn't too drunk to sit up straight, and Severus had seen images of places like this, surreal middle-grounds extending forever in all directions, the kind of places that could trap a man in his own mind for want of escape. Severus wagered Petunia hadn't realized it wasn't the fifties anymore and women could actually leave their houses if they wanted.

He came through an alley along Magnolia Crescent and stopped at Privet Drive's boundary, concerned the blood-wards Dumbledore swore up and down surrounded the house would push him back—but Severus' concern was for naught. He reached out, found nothing, and with each incredulous step forward along the tepid street he continued to find nothing until he stood on Tuney's walk staring at the brass number "4" on the door.

 _There are no blood-wards_.

Swallowing, Severus dismissed the Disillusionment Charm and stomped up the rest of the path, bringing his fist down hard on the door. He had a difficult enough time keeping his right hand clenched around his wand, so he beat the knuckles of his left raw knocking until the neighbor's curtains fluttered.

"Who in the blazes is that?!" cried a male voice inside the house, loud thumps descending a set of stairs. Lights wavered, and a moment later a corpulent man with a thick mustache, dressed in pinstriped pajamas yanked the door open. Severus was painfully reminded of Horace Slughorn—fat, mustachioed, red-faced—but he shoved that recollection aside as easily as he shoved the man back into his own house. Severus slammed the door behind him.

"What in GOD'S NAME—?!"

Severus flicked his wand in the direction of the man's face, and the Muggle went quiet, eyes never leaving the thin strip of wood. _Ah,_ the Potions Master thought. _So Tuney's been telling tales. I wonder what she learned from Lily about wizards like me…._

The Headmaster would be furious when Severus told him he'd forced his way into a Muggle house, let alone Potter's, but the insistent burn in his aching limb didn't allow time for Slytherin subtlety. He'd expected the pain to cease once he arrived at Privet Drive, and yet it continued to build in intensity, a rising pressure biting hard into his seizing muscles and bones until he could barely stand it. "Where is the girl?" Severus demanded in a voice that could chill glaciers.

"What bloody girl?!"

Severus jabbed him with his wand and green sparks singed the Muggle's shirt. Light, rapid steps came down the stairs adjoined to the miserable little foyer, and he sneered as Petunia Evans—still horse-faced, whip-thin, and sour—came into view. The woman took one look at the darkly clad wizard in her home and shrieked.

"YOU!"

"Nice to see you again, too, _Tuney_ ," Severus said as the woman gawked, revulsion and terror competing for purchase on her narrow face. "But I am not here for pleasantries. The girl's life has been threatened and I am here to check on her."

When Petunia's face adopted the color of curdled milk, Severus' stomach tightened further in dread. Something in the house felt _wrong_ , wrong beyond the lack of wards, something he couldn't place as he took in the cabbage rose wallpaper and the stink of cleaning products. He could taste furniture polish in his mouth. The pictures on the walls didn't move, and he felt as though he were surrounded by portraits of dead bodies. "She's—she's not here."

" _Where_ is she?"

Petunia crossed her arms, her eyes flashing toward her husband, then behind her, toward the stairs. "She's—she's at a friend's."

 _Fuck this_ , Severus seethed as he sent a Stunner at the billowing Muggle in front of him and rounded on Petunia.

"Vernon!" she shrieked, moving forward, only to get caught my Severus, his hand curling into a fist on the collar of her nightgown, bringing her head up so he could meet her wide, frightened eyes.

" _Legilimens!_ "

Muggle minds were not like the minds of witches or wizards, another marked separation between mundane and magical. Magical minds had a thin membrane of sorts that, in the head of an accomplished Occlumens, projected a multi-dimensional barrier of the wizard or witch's choice, while Muggle's had no such thing. Severus pulled through Petunia's mind like a swimmer through water, and he detested the woman from the shallows of her being to the deepest abyss of her psyche.

Seeing him again stirred memories of her childhood, snatches of " _Sev!_ " and " _That awful Snape boy_ " flickering by, chased by a girl with apple-red hair and recollections marred by a green-eyed woman's fading laughter.

His own words echoed in Petunia's mind, _"Where is she?"_ , and her thoughts winged through a gallery of Harriet Potter's upbringing, a veritable haunted museum that set Severus' teeth on edge.

 _Dumbledore stood in a pink sitting room with a swaddled infant in his arms. "You must take her, Petunia, for your sister—."_

 _"You're a freak, Lily, a freak!"_

 _Petunia held a black-haired toddler at arm's length and couldn't breathe when curious green eyes stared at her—._

 _"Listen to me, Tuney! You have to be careful, Voldemort is—."_

 _She couldn't stand it. Couldn't stand the judgmental staring. Out of sight, she needed the brat out of sight—and she saw the boot cupboard. She opened the door—._

 _"Get up, you worthless girl!"_

 _A child in bedraggled cast-offs stepped out of the black cupboard and stared at the floor, unable to meet her Aunt's gaze anymore—._

 _Petunia listened to Dudley taunt the girl, flesh striking flesh, a pained cry, and disgust for her own bullying son filled her, twisting to hate because it was the girl's fault, it was always the girl's fault—._

 _Severus Snape stood in her pristine foyer like a black demon released from Hell, freak, he was a freak—._

 _"It's real for us, not for her—."_

 _"Where is she?"_

 _Petunia stormed down the steps because her purse had disappeared in the night, and if the girl had stolen it, she swore she'd wouldn't stop Vernon this time—._

 _Vernon's hands closed around the girl's neck. He'd kill Harriet, kill the green-eyed girl, kill Lily—._

 _"Should've left her at the orphanage, Pet."_

 _The girl winced when Vernon yelled—._

 _"Should've drowned her the first night, Pet."_

 _The girl cringed under a raised hand—._

 _"Should've beat the unnaturalness from her, Pet."_

 _Blood dripped along the girl's chin—._

 _"Should've left her for the dogs, Pet."_

 _"I want my letter! It's mine, and you have no right—!"_

 _Familiar, swirling script marred a sheet of parchment in a young hand, "I must apologize, Miss Evans, but Hogwarts cannot be attended by non-magical persons—." Goddamn Dumbledore, goddamn the freaks who took her—._

 _An elderly man in a pointed hat stood in her pink sitting room with condemnation in his blue eyes, stating, "You must take her—."_

 _Petunia stomped down the stairs. She screamed—._

 _Vernon held the girl off the floor and shook—._

 _Snakes filled her foyer—._

 _Severus Snape stood on her threshold like unholy vengeance and she knew this was penance because—._

 _She stepped into a snake-filled foyer and screamed because—._

 _The girl sobbed for hours behind the cupboard door and Vernon wouldn't relent. Petunia wanted to open the door because—._

 _She stared at the milling snakes and the open cupboard door and knew true guilt because—._

 _Severus Snape stood in her foyer demanding "Where is she?"_

 _Petunia didn't know. She didn't know because—._

 _Because the girl was gone._

Severus wrenched himself out of Petunia's head and snarled, thrusting her away. Petunia collided with the wall at her back and a framed picture of her precious, porcine son fell to the floor, not that either of them or the obese bastard sprawled on the linoleum noticed. Severus and Petunia stared at one another and breathed heavily.

Of the dozens of photos and frames decorating the walls, ascending the stairwell, disappearing into the lounge, not _one_ showed Potter's face.

"She found a way to that _freak_ school, didn't she?" Petunia asked with a sniff as she broke the silence, one hand clutching the railing, the other on her chest. "You work for him, don't you? You work for Dumbledore—?"

Severus took one step closer, and Petunia silenced herself. He trembled with the need to scream. "It's been over a year. It's been over a _fucking_ year since Potter ran away, and you never said a _fucking_ word! Where is she, Petunia?! You let an eleven-year-old girl run out there on her own and told _nobody!_ "

"That's all you care about, isn't it, Snape? Where your precious Potter is. Too bad she doesn't look much like Lily, eh?" Petunia bared her teeth like a cornered dog. "You couldn't have the mother, so you want the daughter now, is it?"

A muscle in his remaining eye twitched. "Are you trying to provoke me?" he asked, voice calm as arctic waters—though inside he howled, wordlessly furious, seeing again how the fat Muggle throttled Potter while Petunia did nothing, while Snape stood in a castle five hundred miles away staring at his own hand like a bloody _fool_ —.

He'd never seen the girl look as small as she did when dangling from Vernon Dursley's squeezing grip.

Severus' wrist had stopped hurting, but the problem had become so much more complicated. He needed to get to Dumbledore. They needed to find Potter.

"That's not going to work, Tuney. Out of the two of us—not counting that useless lump on the floor there, he's only Stunned, you simpering moron—I think _you're_ the pervert. Tell me; did starving an orphan child help relieve your… _frustrations_?"

Color rose in Petunia's cheeks and tears glazed her eyes. Wisely, she said nothing.

"Life must be so _difficult_ for poor, average _Tuney_. An abusive simpleton for a husband rutting away at you, an even stupider son well on his way to incarceration, and here you sit in a mid-sized house smelling of mediocrity and aerosol spray. Is _this_ —." Severus flicked a hand toward the house proper. "Everything you dreamed it would be? Is your life so dull you had to abuse your _niece_ for kicks?"

"I _didn't_ —."

"Save your excuses. I'm sure Dumbledore would _love_ to hear what you've to say for yourself after I tell him what you've put his yearly stipend toward."

He hadn't thought it possible, but Petunia paled further and Severus almost laughed, almost let the scathing, incredulous guffaws come bursting out of himself because Petunia _Dursley_ showed more emotion about the money than she did for her missing niece. The absolute _gall_.

"How could you do this to _Lily's daughter_?" he demanded, more to release the growing pressure in his chest than to ask for an answer. She didn't have an answer that could possibly satisfy him. "Had you and Vernon died instead, Lily would've—."

"She's a freak," Petunia spat as she straightened and pulled herself from the wall.

"I'm well aware of how you view my _kind_."

"No, _she's_ a freak, Snape." The woman stepped forward and the Potions Master stepped back, if only to keep desired distance between himself and loathsome woman. "You've met her, haven't you? I can only _imagine_ how that came about—."

"I teach at her _school_ , you sick degenerative—."

"She's a nasty little freak worse than you or—or Lily ever were! Always sneaking about, always whispering in the dark—."

"An abused child locked in a cupboard _whispering_? My, how very _sinister_." Severus raised his wand again and as Petunia whimpered and he glared, he flicked it toward the boot cupboard. The lock burst off and struck the wall, the door scraping the obnoxious wallpaper when it flung itself open. The interior looked much as it had in Petunia's insufferable head: cleaning products, buckets, brushes, a hoover. In the back resided what Severus sought, and he kicked aside the bottles full of sterile chemicals as he ducked into the cramped space and yanked the dusty pillow off the cot.

He turned the ratty pillow, inspecting the fabric, and plucked off three black hairs between thumb and forefinger. He found an empty vial in his cloak pocket and stuck the hairs in there, then threw the pillow at Petunia. She caught it on instinct more than anything, and Petunia coughed when a cloud of white dust covered her.

Severus could see the flash of police lights through the covered window, and he grunted as he kicked the cupboard door closed, sealing it with a muttered, " _Colloportus_." One of the twitch-curtains must've heard Petunia's shrieking. He stared one last time at the bitter, spiteful woman in her nightdress and curlers, her corpulent husband asleep on the floor still. No matter how he tried, he could see nothing of her sister in Petunia—none of Lily's spirit, joy, her mischievous smirk or charming guile. Petunia existed in antithesis to everything Lily Evans—Lily _Potter_ —had ever been.

He had to find Potter. He had to speak with the Headmaster.

"Tell them he fell down the stairs," he said, eyes flicking toward the front wall. "Dumbledore will be in touch. Pray we don't meet again…Tuney."

With that said, Severus turned and strode down the hallway, into the kitchen where Potter had served her family like a house-elf, and out into the private yard. He Disillusioned himself again, and—just as he began to Disapparate—a strange thought occurred to Severus.

If Petunia hadn't been the one to tell Potter how to reach Diagon Alley, who did?

* * *

 **A/N: to everyone wondering why Harriet ran off and left a tent full of her possessions behind; she's barely twelve, and terrified. Cut the poor little numpty some slack.**

 **Yes, I gave Mrs. Figg onset dementia. The information she's been feeding Dumbledore has suffered from that.**

 **I tried to reflect the nebulous quality of Legilimency, since Snape himself says it's not mind-reading. I think it should be rather confusing and scattered, which makes part of being a great Legilimens sorting the mess out into something intelligible.**


	46. in the morning

**_xlvi. in the morning_**

When Harriet finally stumbled upon Number Twelve, Grimmauld Place, she was surprised.

She didn't know much about pure-bloods. What she did know she'd gathered from snatches of Draco Malfoy's incessant blathering, the typical behavior displayed by her dorm-mates, or Hermione descending into full-blown lecture mode. Harriet expected Elara—stiff-backed, well-mannered, and proper—to live in a house like the ones in Aunt Petunia's programs, somewhere flanked with columns and hedges and reflective pools. Draco Malfoy lived in a manor, and so did Pansy. Daphne resided in a castle, and Katherine Runcorn's family had a six-bedroom estate.

The townhouse in front of Harriet looked large but undeniably derelict, the kind of place one expected ghosts to come pouring out of like bats from a belfry. Light from Number Eleven and Number Thirteen on either side of the house illuminated defects in the walls, cracks marring the bricks, rust eating at the front rail, the stoop littered with years' worth of decaying leaves. Gargoyles leered from the upper balcony, and Harriet half-thought they might spring to life and attack her if she dared go knock on the door.

 _Well,_ the bespectacled witch thought to herself. _Elara did mention the place was a bit rundown, and it's been in the family for generations. Looks like the kind of place a bunch of Slytherins would live—and it's not like I've anywhere else to go_.

Swallowing, Harriet walked up the steps and knocked on the door.

It took several minutes before an answer came, during which Harriet continued to look over her shoulder and her heart raced, Livi wrapped tight about her torso beneath the Cloak's fluttering folds. The door creaked, the handle on the other side twisting, and Harriet let out a breath when Elara Black appeared at the threshold in her dressing gown, long hair falling past her shoulders, tired eyes squinting in the artificial light coming off Number Eleven's stoop.

Harriet yanked the Cloak off her head. "Elara!"

Elara gave one startled shriek of alarm when Harriet's head appeared out of nowhere and leapt backwards, tripping over her hem and landing in a heap on the rug.

"Oh, shite—!" Harriet divested herself of the Cloak and hurried to help the other witch to her feet. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to frighten you—."

She touched Elara's wrist, fingers moving over stiff skin—and her friend wrenched her arm back, stumbling on her own two feet. "It's fine," Elara said as she fixed her sleeve and cleared her throat. "I'm all right, but what are you doing here, Harriet? You scared me! It's barely past two in the morning!"

"Err, right…."

Harriet threw a harried glance out the open door before Elara shut it, plunging them both into the black, musty dark. She felt horribly claustrophobic suddenly, like the walls were inching nearer, or the high ceiling was coming down, ready to smash her into jelly. Sighing, Elara said, "Mind yourself. Come this way." Her hand found Harriet's, and she led the way through the dark, stopping at the corridor's end, where a set of stairs plunged downward. Dim sconces flickered.

They descended, entering a large, dated kitchen with several attached doors and an archway leading into what looked like a dining room, though sheets had been thrown over the furniture, hiding most of it from view. Instead, there was a table in the kitchen, a clunky, ancient looking thing with knife marks on the surface and feet like an eagle's. Elara turned a switch and gas lamps in thick, crystal fixtures woke, shining more light on the weathered space. A hearth dominated one wall, mantel blackened by a hundred years or more of fire and soot.

"It's not much," Elara said, a faint blush in her cheeks. "The house has been basically sitting empty for over a decade, really, what with my older relations getting on and their health failing—."

"I like it," Harriet said. It was the truth; Harriet never felt comfortable in places that were perfectly proper and orderly and clean like Aunt Petunia's house. The cabinets at Privet Drive had been made of composites, painted a light, sickly yellow, the window festooned in lacy curtains, the air always tasting of lemon cleaner and bleach. The cabinets and cupboards here were made of real, solid wood, darkened by an aged patina earned from years of use. Being below ground, there was no window, only those black doors, one of them wreathed by scorch marks. It was spooky, dusty, and _odd_ ; Harriet would always be fond of odd things.

Elara gave a crooked smile, pleased, and gestured at the table. "Well, have a seat. I'll make tea."

Harriet sat. After pulling out a chair, she looked at her hands and saw them shaking, the motion strong enough for Elara to see from her place across the room by the ancient hob. Harriet tossed the Invisibility Cloak aside and, slouching, divested herself of Livi's coils. " _You can get off now._ "

The Horned Serpent hissed, tightening himself, then lowered his body to the floor, slowly circling the legs of Harriet's chair. Kevin poked a curious nose from his pocket, and Harriet took him in her hand, letting the golem twine through her quivering fingers.

"…are you okay?" Elara asked, voice breaking the quiet whoosh of fire beneath the kettle. "I know I asked you to come, but I didn't expect you to arrive in the middle of the night, hiding under your Cloak."

Harriet swallowed. "I—." What could she say? Livi had killed a man; Livi— _her_ pet, _her_ familiar, _her_ responsibility. That wizard was dead, and he hadn't hurt her, hadn't cursed her or struck her. How could Harriet plead self-defense? Would the Aurors come for her? Men like her father? Maybe they'd take her to prison. Maybe she'd wind up in a cell next to _Elara's_ father.

She didn't know if she should tell her best friend or not. What if—what if Elara threw her out? Harriet didn't have anywhere else to go. Instinct had driven her to run to Grimmauld Place simply because she'd been thinking about it for much of the night, and because Elara was here, but maybe Elara didn't want a murderer in her house. _Was_ Harriet a murderer? She hadn't wanted to hurt the wizard, honestly, but what had he been doing there? Would she be kicked out of Hogwarts? Would they snap her wand? Maybe they wouldn't send her to prison. Maybe they'd just hand her back to the Dursleys and let them lock her up in the cupboard, all alone, in the dark, with no escape. _What was she going to do?_ "I—!"

Harriet burst into tears.

Elara jumped and, unsure of what to do, she hurried to finish up the tea and fish out cups from the creaking cupboard overhead. By the time she settled the cups and pot on the table, Harriet's sobs had subsided into hiccups and wet sniffles. The other witch poured the tea and sat, dragging her chair closer. Harriet stared at Elara's flowing hair, her patrician features, and snorted—perhaps hysterically so—at how very pretty her friend was. Harriet was scrawny and more round-shouldered than she'd like, with unmanageable hair and crooked teeth and thick, ugly glasses. It almost seemed unfair.

"What's happened?" Elara asked, voice soft, yet urgent.

Again, Harriet swallowed, and when she found how parched her throat was, she forced herself to take a sip of tea—scalding her tongue in the process. The sting of it centered Harriet's mind as she forced herself to speak. "Livi…Livi killed someone."

Elara's eyes widened, and she glanced down at the snake in question, who was nosing her toes with interest. Harriet thought she might jump to her feet, might scream or demand Harriet leave, and though she braced herself for those possibilities, Elara did nothing. The Black heir drank tea and studied the saucer with a grim expression. "Was it…was it one of your relatives?" she whispered. "Did they hurt you? I can owl my solicitor, or I can find you a proper barrister, if you need."

It floored Harriet that the other witch could be so composed and rational. Sometimes she thought both Elara and Hermione were adults trapped in the bodies of preteens—until they did something to remind her of their own immaturity, like Hermione bickering with Malfoy, or Elara muttering insults behind Professor Selwyn's back. "I—no. No, it wasn't one of my relatives."

"Then who?"

"I don't know," Harriet confessed with a shrug. "I was—I didn't go back. To the Muggles. I…I ran away, I guess, last summer. I just—." She cleared her throat and fussed with her hands, irritating Kevin into sinking his small teeth into her thumb. "Ouch, pest, stop that."

"If you didn't go home, where have you been?"

"Well, I did a bit of traveling, stayed in some inns, maybe a night or two in a tent—."

Elara's hand came up, interrupting her rambling, and Harriet could see the mounting lecture behind her friend's colorless eyes. "What do you mean _a tent_? Have you been staying in a _tent_?"

"Yes, okay? I've been staying in a tent!" Harriet snapped, cheeks flushed. "And this bloke I don't know came waltzing in tonight, wand drawn, saying he's been looking for me and he's supposed to take me somewhere, and—and he tried to hex me with something, I don't know, and then Livi—."

 _He's dead. He's dead. He tried to kidnap me, and now he's—._

"He was _looking_ for you?"

"Yes."

"What did he want?"

"I don't _know_." Harriet rubbed at her eyes and almost knocked her glasses off. "I was in the middle of the woods, miles from town, and he came in with his wand drawn. He—he was threatening, not that he threatened me precisely, but his whole manner and bearing, and—and he was swearing at me—." She lowered her voice. "He said something about his _lord_."

Elara paled. It could be nothing. It could be nothing more than the throwaway address of a pure-blooded wizard speaking of a Noble House's head, and yet it could have been everything. Harriet only knew of one wizard who creepy men trying to kidnap children might call " _my lord_."

Somewhere in the house, Harriet could hear a clock ticking—the low, deep ticking of a big grandfather clock—and portraits deeper in Grimmauld's confines murmured among one another. It was quieter than Harriet had expected. She'd been inside magical inns and shops and taverns, but she'd never been inside a magical home before, unless one were to count the tent—.

 _The tent._

Harriet leapt to her feet and banged her knee beneath the table, toppling her tea. Elara flinched.

"My things," the bespectacled witch gasped, horrified. " _My things_. I left all of there, with—. I didn't even consider—! They'll find the body, and they'll find my stuff and think I murdered him—." Maybe she did murder him. Maybe it was all her fault. "—and I'll go to _prison_ —!"

She took two steps toward the door before Elara caught her by the arm, and when Harriet tried to shrug her off, Elara grasped the shorter girl's shoulders, holding her steady. "Harriet," she said, fingers biting down until Harriet stopped trying to run. "Harriet, _listen_ to me. You said this wizard was looking for you, yes?"

"Yes!"

"He tried to take you somewhere against your will? To someone he called 'my lord?'"

"Yes, Elara, I need to—!"

Elara kept speaking, drowning out Harriet's out panicked blabbering. "Then who's to say there aren't _more_ wizards out looking for you? You can't go for your things. It's not safe."

"But what do I do, then?! I'm such a bloody _idiot_ —!"

"You stay here." Elara tapped her bare foot on the floor in emphasis.

"What if there _are_ more wizards? What if they follow me _here_?" _What if they want more than a quick word? What if they hurt you?_

The taller witch shook her head. "They can't. The house is warded—I've mentioned this before. Just look how difficult it is for me to get owls, typically. No one can find you; you're _safe_ , okay? You can't go for your things. We can—I can write my solicitor in the morning. Or the Headmaster. We'll write someone, and we'll figure this out. It was self-defense, and you're _not_ going to be punished for that, Harriet."

"How can you be so sure?" she asked. Harriet felt tired—tired and miserable and scared. She would do anything for a measure of Elara's composure and confidence, when all she could do was lean into her friend's hands, swallowing the urge to sob again. _I'm not a baby_ , she told herself, sucking in air, holding it in her chest until it burned. _I'm not going to cry._

Hesitating, Elara pulled her into an awkward hug, and Harriet took advantage of the moment to squeeze the other girl tight. Elara wasn't one for casual touching, usually, and Harriet had found that she very much liked hugs. "We'll figure it out," Elara said once she stepped back. "We'll get some sleep, and in the morning we'll know what to do. It'll be better in the morning." She nodded, and Harriet nodded in turn, though she didn't think she agreed with Elara's assessment. She did not think morning would make anything better. "Come on, you'll have to sleep in my room. I haven't tackled any of the others yet."

Harriet followed her from the kitchen, back into the inky dark of Grimmauld Place, and as they tromped up the stairs beneath the leering gaze of strange, stuffed heads, she couldn't help but think this year might be even more complicated than the last.

* * *

 **A/N: I take some creative license in Grimmauld's design and layout.**


	47. bury your secrets

**_xlvii. bury your secrets_**

Severus was going to kill Harriet Potter.

Dawn sat heavy upon the horizon, thick and as yellow as Dumbledore's perduring lemon sherbets, the heat already seeping into the earth and into Severus' covered shoulders. The sleepless night and several rapid Apparitions across the isle left the Potions Master somewhat listless; he paused in his hike through the desolate wood to catch his breath, glaring at the sprig of evergreen tied together with Potter's hair floating at eye-level. It continued on, and Severus jerked his cloak out of the leaves, stomping forward.

If he found Potter before the Headmaster, she was going to wish she'd never been born.

The Locater Effigy was, technically, Dark magic—albeit Dark magic Dumbledore turned a blind-eye to if it meant finding Potter before somebody less savory did, though Severus imagined he'd be receiving a rather harsh and tedious lecture later that evening. Breaking and entering, threatening Muggles, performing Dark spells—Severus felt sixteen again, terrified of what the Headmaster would do after he'd gone too far and hexed James Potter's nose off the bastard's fat face. Once the urgency passed, Albus would think upon his punishment, and Severus knew it'd be decidedly unpleasant.

 _Hugging a Weasley_ , he thought, dredging up the most ridiculous situations he could to keep his mind busy. _Becoming chapter president of a Longbottom fan club. Tea with Trelawney—oh, hell, I'd pitch myself off the Astronomy Tower first_.

Dumbledore had more concerning issues to attend to at the moment than Severus' misdemeanors. When the Potions Master had barged into the older wizard's office at an ungodly hour when any sane man would've been fast asleep, he found the Headmaster awake and reading—and surprised to see Severus. That surprise twisted into shock, then anger, then fear as Severus relayed his false tip about Potter possibly being targeted by his past associates and his subsequent trip to Privet Drive. Upon hearing the blood-wards had failed, Dumbledore soared to one of his shelves and pulled forward a silver instrument gone silent, dark, and dusty.

A branch caught the hem of his cloak and Severus slid on the leaves, grunting. _What is the brat_ doing _out here?_ Bantiaumyrddin was fourteen kilometers to the west, but had the girl been there, the Effigy would have brought Severus to the village, not here, not to the middle of the bloody forest with nothing around aside from a Muggle town roughly six kilometers behind him. The Vow let him know she'd escaped danger and yet lived, otherwise Severus would think someone had murdered the girl and dumped her body out here.

Severus was well and truly fuming by the time he crested the rise and stepped into a clearing, prepared to drag Potter back to Hogwarts by the ear if he had to. Slytherin would, hopefully, be preoccupied with some nefarious, long-winded project bent on corrupting impressionable youths, else Severus would have to bring her somewhere else, possibly the old Dumbledore cottage in Godric's Hollow, or—Merlin forbid—Spinner's End.

A tent resided in the clearing's middle. The Locater Effigy lazily drifted closer and closer, until the Charm ceased and dropped onto the canvas with a slight plop. _A tent_ , Severus thought. _The girl who survived the Dark Lord's Killing Curse not once, but twice, is living in a tent. Marvelous_.

He brought his feet down hard on the ground, breaking leaves and twigs beneath his boots to announce his presence. The tent's flap fluttered in the warm air.

"Potter!" Severus shouted, cursing himself for a fool when his voice echoed, and he glanced about the empty woods. "Miss Potter, present yourself, _now_."

With no answer forthcoming, Severus kicked the flap aside, stepped into the expanded space beyond—and found himself staring at a dead man.

He would have known the wizard sprawled on the floor was dead by the smell alone and didn't need to see the blood pooled beneath his leg and backside, nor the ghastly, mottled pallor of his swollen face. Wand in hand, Severus took two cautious steps forward and checked the area, finding no sign of a wayward Slytherin girl. Her possessions lay scattered about the tent: books and used clothes, an open package of Every Flavor Beans, a glass cauldron filled to the brim with rare Mermaid's Tears—though he had no bloody idea where she'd gotten _that_. A Girding Potion sat off to the side, congealing in the open air, and Severus glanced down at the summer essay he'd assigned half-completed on the floor.

Frowning, he crouched and laid the backs of his fingers against the cauldron, gauging the iron's temperature. "Cold," he murmured, glancing at the dead man. She'd been gone for hours at the least, and Severus guessed the wizard was the cause of the Vow's reaction last night. He must have threatened Potter, and the girl's Horned Serpent took care of the rest. "And she walks around with it like it's a scarf, insolent little fool."

Severus straightened, crossed the space, and used his foot to angle the wizard's face toward the morning light. He didn't recognize the man, but the crest on the front pocket and the robes were clearly Ministry issue. The man's wand rested in his rigid hand, which further proved he'd threatened the girl, and she'd been so terrified—or simply scared stupid—she left behind everything she owned and ran. Not that she would've been able to take the tent; legal Expansion Charms wouldn't close upon human bodies, living or dead. In fact, they were specifically engineered not to so kidnappers and killers couldn't go about lugging people about in bloody coin purses. He couldn't quite picture Potter dragging a dead man outside without the use of her wand.

Severus pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed.

Footsteps moving through the underbrush without discretion jerked his eye's toward the loose flap where. Severus quickly Disillusioned himself and stepped back into the shadows, confident the dead body on the floor would distract from any discerning shimmers left in the air. Moments later, the flap again open—ripped aside, hanging by a few loose filaments—and another wizard entered the tent.

He was initially dressed as a Muggle, but with a muttered incantation, his navy robes fell past his knees and the hat on his dark head disappeared. "Morgana's knickers," he cursed upon seeing the dead man, and with a suspicious glance over his shoulder, the man turned his profile toward the light. Severus froze. He froze because he recognized the wizard.

Cloyd Dogbane had never been much of a Death Eater—though, he _had_ managed to impress the Dark Lord enough to be branded, which, contrary to popular belief, was not a simple feat to attain. Dogbane had flitted through the various Dark social spheres, too stupid to be a researcher like Severus, too impure to follow Lucius, and not fanatical enough for the likes of the Lestranges. In the wake of Voldemort's downfall, schisms formed between the ranks, the old guard chasing Slytherin, those with a lust for influence falling into Gaunt's camp, while the sycophantic stood by their defeated Dark Lord—and mostly went to Azkaban.

Severus didn't think he'd ever spared a thought for Cloyd Dogbane, not even when he gave the man's name to Dumbledore a dozen years ago. It figured he became a low-level Ministry grunt.

Lifting his wand, Severus summoned forth his will and hissed, " _Imperio_."

Yellow mist seeped into Dogbane's ears, freezing the wizard, who slowly turned to face a Disillusioned Severus.

"Why are you here?" he asked in an undertone, and though Dogbane opened his mouth to answer, the Potions Master disregarded whatever drivel he'd been about to spill and peered into his eyes. Dogbane's mind proved just as scattered as Petunia's, if not more so, scarred by Dark magic and the man's own perverse ideologies, throwing Severus from image to image like one of those Muggle pinball machines. No concrete reason for being in the middle of Oxfordshire existed in his head, only brief flashes of a familiar, dreaded silhouette barking orders that Dogbane was not to question. Those orders had led him—and the lout on the floor—to the tent, but not because of the locale.

Severus sucked air through his teeth as he freed himself from Dogbane's pitiful brain and stared at the wizard's listless, blank eyes. The dread that'd been twisting his stomach for hours intensified. He resisted the urge to be sick and drew upon his Occlusion, shutting his unease behind water and ice, letting the edges blur in the murky undertow.

" _Obliviate_ ," he muttered, flicking his wand by Dogbane's temple. The spell took, erasing the past several minutes from the wizard's head, leaving his consciousness soft and malleable. "You discovered nothing in these woods. You could not find your compatriot and wonder if he's decided to leave the country and abandon the Ministry. Having no success in finding Harriet Potter, you have the unquestionable urge to return home and drink yourself insouciant. When you awaken, you will make your report to your master."

Severus took a step to the side and Dogbane swayed for an instant, then shook his head as the Imperius dissolved, leaving the man disoriented and compelled to do as ordered. Severus sneered as Dogbane turned and headed out of the tent. He remembered little of the man, but he _did_ recall Dogbane's proclivity for drink; the best compulsions centered upon objects, events, and scenarios the cursed person in question found pleasurable. Dogbane gave the dead man and the tent little thought, so focused on getting pissed, he Apparated from one step to the next.

Severus waited. A minute passed, then another, and he exhaled, letting the Disillusionment fall, appearing once more—dark, disheveled, and exhausted—in Potter's tent. He considered what he'd seen in Dogbane's thoughts as he lifted his wand, silver light flooding the space as a watery Patronus took form. "Headmaster. The girl's been attacked and has fled, leaving…matters for me to attend. Gaunt sent out a pair of wizards to find her." Severus paused. "Someone has informed him of what occurred in June. He is…intrigued."

The Patronus bounded through the canvas wall, taking the colorless light with it. Again, Severus waited with his arms crossed and his back stiff, listening to the birds sing and the breeze whisper, until silver light again blossomed into being, and a radiant phoenix burst through the wall, the sight just as ostentatious and eye-searing as its caster. " _I believe I know where she has gone_ ," the phoenix echoed. " _Return to the castle so we may proceed._ "

Muttering about demanding old men, Severus dismissed the Headmaster's summons and turned his attention instead to the wizard upon the floor. _Pitiful. Defeated by a scared twelve-year-old and a snake._ Wrinkling his nose against the smell, the Potions Master crouched and used his wand to slice the wizard's left sleeve down to the elbow. Parting the fabric revealed the anticipated Dark Mark, glamored to be inconspicuous unless a person knew it was there.

 _How does Gaunt know about her? How does he know what happened last term? Who told him?_

A silent _mobilicorpus_ sent the body outside, Severus scouring the bloody stains left behind until the floor was somewhat clean, or would at least pass Ministry inspection. Spotting the trunk left at the foot of the bed, he opened it and performed a cursory search for the Invisibility Cloak, releasing a breath when he failed to turn anything up. Either the girl had hidden it well or she'd had enough sense to take it with her.

Another flick of the wand sent Potter's possessions soaring into the trunk before he sealed it, lock clattering home, the Girding Potion vanishing and her essay—with her bloody name on it, left at the scene of a murder for Merlin's sake—was tucked into Severus' pocket. He followed the trunk out of the tent, and once standing in the open wood again, collapsed the structure and shrunk both it and the trunk so he could swipe them off the forest floor and stuff them into a cloak pocket.

Severus found it indicative of his life's wretched state that he knew the proper spells for digging a grave and had practiced them enough over the years to be proficient. He exhumed six feet of earth and levered the Death Eater into the new hole, the body falling down with a heavy, dull thump, before Severus muttered an incantation and purple flames consumed the dead man.

The smokeless inferno writhed above the grave's edges, the color reflected in Severus' blank, tired stare as he watched, his mind roving far from that quiet clearing and the morning-clad forest. He'd buried, burned, dismembered, and destroyed more than one body at the behest of the Dark Lord—be it Voldemort or Slytherin—or Dumbledore. He'd killed as well, though not with the same frequency, and those faces still haunted his unsuspecting thoughts from time to time.

The Wizarding community as a whole mistakenly assumed Death Eaters came into the Dark Lord's service under the assumption of being racists, kidnappers, rapists, and murderers. Had that been true, the Dark Lord would have had very few followers indeed, aside from maybe Bellatrix, the mad bint. The Dark Lord appealed to a man, or woman's, desires, and like a compulsion, he found all that was malleable in a person's mind, in their very soul, until he created something useful to him. He preyed upon pure-blooded fear of Muggle incursion, on a savage man's need to dominate, on a scholar's wish to learn. The Dark Lord could twist even those with the purest of hearts into his pawns.

Not that Severus considered himself _pure of heart_. He snorted at the very idea as the fire simmered and began to disperse. No, even as an angry, idiot teenager, he'd not been naive enough to mistake the Dark Lord for a man of _good intentions_. However, if Severus had known poison research and Potions mastery would turn into disposing of the bodies of families ruined by the Dark Lord's more brutal servants, he liked to think he wouldn't have been fucking stupid enough to kneel at the bastard's feet. Reality rarely matched expectations, which Severus learned well when he found himself ankle-deep in human viscera, sicking up his own guts, a hair's breadth away from being tortured mad if he didn't stop " _disappointing"_ his master. The Dark Lord had no patience for those who disappointed him.

Severus shook himself. Exhaustion plagued him, dredging up pointless memories, which he dismissed and drowned in Occlusion as he rubbed his dry eyes and poured dirt into the grave. The fire died beneath the earth and what dirt the body displaced swiftly dispersed, leaving an innocuous stretch of ground in the forest Severus covered with kicked leaves and twigs.

" _Appare Vestigium_ ," he said, and blotches of color came into view, highlighting the traces of magic and residual human presence—the very same residue the Locater Effigy had followed to the clearing in the first place, drawn to the most potent resonance of Potter's being. Severus lifted his gaze and traced the footsteps leading from the site back toward the Muggle town. Potter had gone that way. At least he knew she wasn't lost in the countryside somewhere.

The Potions Master went about obliterating the traces, hiding the grave and clearing from both magical detection and mundane sight. When finished, he tucked his wand away and exhaled. _I've buried bodies for Death Eaters, for the Order, and now for Harriet Potter,_ Severus thought. _Merlin save Lily's daughter if it's not the last._

With a final step, the darkly clad wizard Disapparated. Nothing remained but a lingering smell of burning flesh, and even that disappeared into the rising wind.

* * *

 **A/N: just to be safe, there were two chapters updated, both xlvi. and xlvii. Make sure you read both!**


	48. a most sullen house-elf

**_xlviii. a most sullen house-elf_**

Harriet woke to the ugliest creature she had ever seen poking her in the face.

The strength of its miniature glower could've matched Professor Snape's, had the creature been more than three feet tall, stooped, and covered in sallow, sagging folds of flesh. It wore a pillowcase of all things, the hem tatty and impatiently stitched, nose bulbous and red while white hair sprung from its large ears in thick bushels.

"It's awake," it croaked.

Harriet flung herself backward, away from the creature, and slammed her head into a solid wood headboard. Stars burst before her eyes. "Ow!"

The lumpy, hunched thing grinned nastily at Harriet. "The blood-traitor's daughter is telling Kreacher to check on the half-blood."

"Who—?"

He—or Harriet thought it was a _he_ , a goblin of some kind, maybe? A very rude goblin—hopped off the bed and landed on the floor with a solid thump. Below, Livi stirred the bed skirt and hissed with menace, causing the creature to round his eyes and back away, glaring at the scaled tail poking out from the fabric. He disappeared out the door, leaving it ajar, and Harriet flopped back onto the mattress.

 _Right. I'm at Elara's house, in her bedroom._

She stared at the ceiling for a long minute and didn't move, didn't do much of anything aside from breathe and let the memories from the night before float through her head like gross, mucky water. Harriet felt like she was drowning in that water, so she squeezed her eyes closed, then opened them wide, taking in such a sharp breath her chest ached. _It's okay. I'm okay. It's okay._

Harriet studied the room, the funny posters mostly hidden behind tacked up parchment and the garish Gryffindor colors, Elara's trunk open at the bed's foot with its tidy contents open for inspection. Harriet thought of her own trunk and cursed herself for an idiot as she sat up, pushing the pads of her fingertips into her shut eyes until she saw stars. How could she leave the bloody trunk behind?

Livius slithered out the open door after the creature, his scales creating the softest rasping sound as his belly rubbed on the old floors, and Harriet hissed, " _Don't go scaring people._ "

" _Sss_ …."

Sighing, Harriet wriggled her way out from under the counterpane and fumbled for her glasses on the nightstand, knocking her wand off in the process. The stick clattered on the floor and Harriet, swearing under her breath, dropped to her knees to look beneath the bed, pushing aside the blanket Livi had made an impromptu nest from so she could snatch up her wand and strap it and her brace to her wrist. She wasn't going to forget it again.

She glanced at the blurred edge of her shadow, softened by the weak light, and whispered, "Set?"

No response came, which didn't surprise Harriet, really; Set chose when to make his presence known and not a moment beforehand—typically manifesting just long enough to save her life or throw said life into mayhem. She wished he'd stop throwing things at Parkinson, no matter how loathsome she could be at times.

Rising, Harriet shut the door and shuffled out of her borrowed nightgown, pulling on her clothes from the day prior even as she shuddered and grimaced when the weight of the old shirt settled on her scrawny shoulders. She'd almost forgotten about Kevin until he poked his head out from the pocket and hissed his irked defiance.

Harriet sidled out of the room and into the dark hall, peeking about the gloomy space with hesitation before following the thumps of movement to the next door down. Elara stood by the hearth inside, going through a crooked dresser with what looked like an old fireplace poker, dropping moth-eaten trousers and ancient shorts onto the floor while watching Livi from the corner of her eyes. She seemed vaguely wary—and Harriet guessed she should be, given that Livi killed a man last night.

 _Livi killed somebody. What will happen to him when they come for me? Will they kill Livi? Should I tell him to run away?_

"Harriet? Are you all right?"

Harriet blinked and found Elara had turned from the dresser to study her, poker hanging uncertainly from a sooty hand. "Yeah," Harriet said. "I—." She cleared her throat, swallowed, and tried again. "Morning. What—what are you doing in here?"

"Oh." Elara looked at the poker as if she hadn't realized she was holding it. "Well, you'll need a room to sleep in, yes? I thought you might like this one next to mine, though there are others, if you prefer. No offense; you kick like a horse in your sleep."

Harriet couldn't help but snort. "I'm sorry."

"It's fine." Elara went back to poking through the drawer. "The house is, um, old? I told you this before. My relatives were—well, frankly, most of my relatives were mad, or close enough to mad. There's a fairly good chance someone's either left a nasty hex laying about and it's gone to seed, or they cursed their pants to chew off your fingers."

Harriet stared at the dresser in horror. Not a moment later, Elara found something solid inside the drawer and flipped it out from under the musty clothes, an old shoes landing on the floor with a heavy thump. The leather split from the sole and shaped itself into little teeth before the shoe came flying and snarling at Harriet, who leapt back, banging her shoulder into the door. "Ow!"

With a grunt, Elara swung the poker and stabbed the shoe, pinning it to the floor. It struggled, so Elara hit it again, and the shoe gave one last gasp before quieting. Elara prodded it a few times to make sure it was well and truly defeated before shoving it off into her discarded pile. "Biting Hex."

A thump and a squeal came from the window, and the two girls turned to see Livi partially ensconced in the writhing curtains, from which a cloud of miniature blue men with wings came screaming out of. Livi, unabashed, peeked from behind the fabric, tiny legs disappearing into his maw.

" _Livi_!" Harriet hissed, worried her snake had just evicted some kind of pet, but Elara only smirked.

"Maybe the Doxies will stop tearing the curtains to shreds now. The repellent they sell in Diagon Alley does _not_ work."

Livi swallowed the Doxy whole and flicked his tongue in Harriet's direction, clearly dismissing her concerns.

Elara finished clearing out one drawer and moved onto the next, seeming in no particular hurry, both girls lost in their own thoughts as they best tried to approach the events from last night. "Why don't you use your wand?" Harriet blurted out.

"Pardon?"

"Your wand." She waved at the mess. "Malfoy was bangin' on about how stupid he thinks some families are to adhere to the 'no magic' thing in the summers because the Ministry can't tell if magic's cast in a magical home or something? This is a magical house, so can't you use magic?"

Comprehension dawned in Elara's expression, and she muttered a soft, "Ah," as she kept on with the poker. "That's a ward; Uncle Cygnus told me about it, and not every family has someone who can cast it or afford the wardsmith to make it. The Ministry's Trace is always active on wands, but in places like Diagon or Hogwarts or other public areas, they don't follow the spells. They can't _really_ tell whose wand did what. If you were to walk into the heart of London and start casting, the Ministry would be notified because it's a Muggle area. Private dwellings can have the Untraceable Ward sealed on them, but the ward has to be keyed to an adult's wand, and well—." Here Elara shrugged. They were no adults at Grimmauld.

Harriet remained quiet for a time, stroking a finger over Kevin's head as the golem continued to pout in her pocket. "Who was that earlier that woke me up?"

"Woke you up?"

"Yeah, he—it? _He_?—came in and poked me in the face until I got up!"

"Poked you in the—?" Elara's confused questioning cut off with an abrupt scowl as she slammed the drawer shut. "Kreacher."

A loud crack heralded the sudden return of the wrinkled creature, and Harriet hit the door again, swearing when her elbow collided with the solid wood. The creature leered at Harriet before turning his attention to Elara, who glared down her straight nose and met the sullen imp glower for glower. "I said to _check_ on her, not _wake_ her, didn't I?"

The creature—Kreacher? If that wasn't an apt name, Harriet didn't know what was—tilted his head back and sneered, the folds on his wizened face quivering. "Kreacher _was_ just checking. He had to check if it was still alive."

"Don't call her _it_."

Kreacher sniffed. "Whatever the blood-traitor's daughter wishes. Kreacher lives to serve the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black."

"I _mean it_ , Kreacher!"

The imp sneered. "Of course, _Mistress_."

Harriet had never heard Elara swear, but she looked very close to doing so as her face flushed an angry red. "Clean this up," she said, pointing at the pile of discarded clothes.

"Of course, _Mistress_." Kreacher snapped his fingers, and the pile disappeared. "Does the blood-traitor's daughter or the half-breed need anything else?"

"No."

He tottered off after that, Harriet carefully maneuvering around him until she came to stand by Elara. The door slammed on its own with a loud _bang!_

"He makes me so furious," Elara muttered as she dropped the poker back onto the hearth's rack. Her hand was left sooty, and upon spying the mess, Elara's lip curled and she pulled out a handkerchief from her skirt pocket. "If I didn't think he'd quite literally murder me in my sleep, I'd give him clothes and be done with it."

"But didn't you just give him clothes…?"

"No. It's more an expression than anything, since you have to _hand_ a house-elf clothes to free them. That's why Kreacher wears that grubby pillowcase."

" _That_ was a house-elf?" Harriet had heard of them before—they came up in conversation often enough in Slytherin House—but she'd never seen one before.

"Yes. Probably the oldest and most sullen house-elf in all of Great Britain, really." She stopped wiping her hand and let out a frustrated sigh. "We should have breakfast. Come on…."

Elara led the way back into the hall and down the stairs, seeming to know the path well enough in the dimly lit passage, pausing only once to mutter about a covered portrait that Harriet didn't quite hear before they moved on. The kitchen was much as it had been earlier that very morning, the sconces coming on with reluctance, Harriet's Invisibility Cloak slung atop the shifted chairs. Elara fished out a box of tea from somewhere, and Harriet went about picking ingredients from the cupboard Charmed to stay cool.

They didn't say anything to one another until they were seated at the table, a plate of breakfast before each girl, Harriet's stomach still too tense to manage much else besides a bite or two toast. Finally, she plucked up the courage to break the silence. "What am I going to do, Elara?"

The older girl—usually so much more composed than Harriet—bit her lip and chased a bit of egg with her fork. "I'm not…not really sure. Like I said last night, I can write my solicitor. He can at least find out if the D.M.L.E has…issued a warrant? Though I wouldn't think they'd do that. I think they'd be more worried about your safety. Most likely."

The uncertainty in Elara's voice did little to spare Harriet's dwindling spirits. Her face paled considerably as she dropped bacon crumbles into her front pocket for Kevin's benefit. "Do they send little girls to prison in the magical world?"

"Don't be preposterous." Elara didn't quite meet her eyes as she went about making another cuppa. "What kind of society would put little girls in gaol?"

"The kind of societies that have blokes calling themselves Dark Lords who go about trying to kill babies?"

"You really shouldn't be so flippant about that, please." Elara stirred milk into her tea, and when she released the spoon, it continued to spiral in lazy circles. "What happened last night was self-defense."

"But what about Livi?"

"Perhaps…perhaps you could say it was a wild snake?"

"Would anybody _believe_ that?"

Elara shrugged as she stood up from the table and gathered their dishes, bringing the lot to the sink. "They have the burden of proof, just like in the Muggle justice system."

"The what?"

"They have to _prove_ your snake killed him. They have to prove you own a snake—and given that no one knows you're a Parselmouth, they're not about to believe you've kept a Horned Serpent around."

"Remember what Snape said at Halloween, though? That if he ever heard me say anything as 'brain dead' as _needing proof_ , he'd have me dissecting cauldrons or something for the next six years?"

"Yes, well, Snape's a—." Elara dropped a spoon and it clattered against the cast-iron sink. "Not a very nice man. However, we have to worry about the Ministry, not Snape at the moment, so I think it'd be best if I wrote to Mr. Piers. He can probably tell us what to do."

Harriet hummed her assent, glumly kicking her feet back and forth as she gazed into her empty cup and tried to make sense of the lumpy tea bits left behind. Elara was a good friend—maybe even a better friend than Harriet deserved, as she hadn't slammed the door in her face when Harriet showed up at an indecent hour trailing all sorts of nonsense. Harriet's own flesh and blood would've never treated her half as well. They didn't even give her a bedroom.

Crackling from the hearth drew Harriet's attention. The cinders of old wood resting in its belly shifted and sparked, sending up a plume of green embers. She hadn't seen Elara light it, though she guessed it could have been that—Kreacher fellow, sneaking about.

"Elara," Harriet asked aloud, frowning.

From her spot by the sink, Elara answered with a preoccupied, "Hmm?", her hands slick with soap.

"Why's your fire green? I've only seen that in Diagon Alley."

"What?" Elara turned off the water.

"I said, _why's_ your fire _green_ —."

Elara whirled around. "Harriet, get away from there—!"

The other witch's shouted warning came too late, for she hadn't finished speaking before the flames burst high and licked the mantel—issuing forth the black-clad figure of a familiar wizard stepping from the simmering coals. Harriet knocked her teacup off the table and it shattered on the floor.

Severus Snape straightened to his full height, and, with a dismissive look at the mess, sneered, "Potter."

Harriet gulped.

* * *

 **A/N: Sorry for the late update! Real life is murderous.**


	49. dumbledore's decision

**_xlix. dumbledore's decision_**

Harriet had no words. Her mouth moved, and yet she couldn't make a sound come out.

The Potions Master stepped fully from the hearth and his robes settled about his lanky frame, the grim man fitting well with Grimmauld's less than chipper decor. Harriet couldn't begin to guess what Professor Snape did over his summers, but it certainly wasn't sunbathing; he was paler than ever and exhausted, black smudges marring his eyelids, oily hair windblown and sporting a few bits of leaves. The expression he wore was caught somewhere between vindicated and furious—which did not bode well for Harriet.

In an instant, Elara came to her side, dripping suds and water from her wet sleeves, a spoon held in her hand instead of her wand. "How did you get through the Floo?" she demanded.

Snape didn't answer. He sneered and took two steps to the side. Harriet wondered what he was doing—and then the fire sputtered again, flaring bright green, and a second wizard stepped past the grate as they swept into the kitchen.

Headmaster Dumbledore made for a far more impressive, if less terrifying, figure than Professor Snape.

"Ah, Harriet. There you are," the older wizard said with gentle smile. "You gave us quite a fright, my dear."

Harriet continued to gawk like a gormless fool. Elara came to her senses first.

"Excuse me, H-Headmaster? But how did you—?" Elara gestured at the fireplace with her spoon, then dropped the wet utensil on the table, cheeks turning pink.

"Of course. Pardon our intrusion, Miss Black, and rest assured, your home's formidable wards are still perfectly intact. You see, we suspected Miss Potter might be here and, worried about her safety, I asked a favor of a dear friend and old pupil working in the Department of Magical Transportation at the Ministry." Dumbledore gave a mild shrug after his explanation—which Harriet took to mean he asked a former student to help him and Snape do a little secret breaking and entering through Elara's protected Floo. Harriet, shocked and still a touch hysterical from her eventful night, choked on a laugh.

Snape glared.

"Forgive me for saying, Headmaster," Snape spoke in his most oily tone, the one he always used before verbally eviscerating Longbottom's worst potions. "But I believe Misses Black and Potter can overlook our intrusion, considering a man is _dead_ and Potter here might well be guilty of his murder."

Both Harriet and Elara gaped. _How does he know?!_ "I—I didn't!" Harriet cried, all thoughts of claiming ignorance escaping her head like bubbles popping one by one. Standing in front of her headmaster and professor, Harriet felt very much like a criminal about to be charged with the most heinous of crimes.

"No, it was that _snake_ you insist on strutting about with! Wrapped around your insolent little neck—!"

"Severus," Professor Dumbledore said, lifting a hand. Professor Snape cut off abruptly and lowered his head, dark hair falling forward around his stiff face. "I believe our dear Potions Master is simply concerned for you, Harriet—." Elara stifled a snort. "You see, when we learned of a threat made against your person, Professor Snape went to check on you at home. He was surprised to learn that, not only were you not there, but you hadn't been seen by your relatives since last summer."

All eyes fell upon Harriet and she felt her face heat, the disapproval clear in Dumbledore's voice. "So?" she retorted. "That's not—. It doesn't—. You said someone _threatened_ me?"

The quick misdirection didn't fool either wizard, but the Headmaster was content to answer her. "Yes. Indirectly, really."

"It didn't feel indirectly when he tried to curse me!"

Dumbledore's eyes sharpened. "And were you cursed, Harriet? Are you hurt anywhere?"

She flushed a bit more, eyes dancing between the two wizards. "He—I think he used the same spell Quirrell did in the dungeons. A red one. It—it grazed my arm a bit and I felt breathless and…dazed."

The older wizard nodded his head as if he'd expected as much. "Your attacker used a Stunning Spell, if I am not mistaken. We don't teach the incantation until your fourth year at Hogwarts."

"What's going to happen to me now, Professor? Am I…am I in trouble?"

Headmaster Dumbledore sighed and glanced about Elara's drab kitchen. "I believe we should have a seat and share a nice cup of tea before we have our conversation. So long as Miss Black doesn't mind our imposition?"

"Harriet's not imposing," Elara said with the faintest trace of ' _but you are_ ' lingering in her tone. Harriet didn't have a sliver of the kind of nerve it must take to stare down her nose at Albus Dumbledore like Elara could. "She lives here."

" _Does_ she now?" Snape cut in, watching her with a derisive eye. "As far as the school records are concerned, Potter lives at Number Four, Privet Drive, in Surrey—or was it a tent in the middle of the woods? Forgive me if I have things… _confused_."

"Severus, would you see to making that tea?" Dumbledore said, and even Harriet heard the reprimand in that softly voiced order. Snape narrowed his eyes, but he jerked his head in a short nod and swept past the girls deeper into the kitchen. Elara looked somewhat alarmed by the Potions Master's presence as he started rifling through her cabinets, yet she said nothing to stop him.

Dumbledore ushered Harriet over to one of the chairs and she sat, Dumbledore taking a spot across from her, Elara sliding into the seat at Harriet's side. Snape was still making the tea—like a Muggle, which Harriet thought was the weirdest thing she'd seen today.

"You're not in trouble, Harriet," the Headmaster began. "The matter has been taken care of already, and you won't be hearing an inquiry from the Ministry. I would, however, ask that you not speak of what happened with anyone outside of this room—though, I will amend that request to include Miss Granger as an allowable confidante." He smiled as Snape set a cup before him, thanking the dour wizard. Snape gave Harriet a cup as well—dropped it, really, flecking the table with dark tea—and she ignored it. Ever since Quirrell dosed her cuppa, she hadn't much liked tea not prepared by herself or someone she trusted implicitly, like Elara. "If someone were to bring up the topic with you, please feign ignorance and find either myself or Professor Snape. Is that understood?"

Harriet nodded. Elara was looking at her own tea as if Snape had spat in it, and the Potions Master had neglected to take a seat, opting to stand behind Dumbledore like a looming bailiff waiting for the order to drag Harriet off to the dungeons. "Yes, professor."

"Good. I must also express some concern about your familiar." Noting Harriet's instant alarm and opened mouth, Dumbledore lifted his hand—much as he had with Snape some minutes prior—and she fell silent. "Your Horned Serpent isn't in trouble either, but in light of these events, I worry your familiar may pose a danger to you or your classmates."

"Livi would never," Harriet argued, though a queasy feeling had started building in her middle. "He—he was only protecting me!"

"And what would happen should he feel you were threatened by a fellow student? If you, perhaps, became frightened by misplaced bullying? Your familiar, clever and loyal as I am sure he is, is still an animal, Harriet. Animals are a wonderful source of companionship, but they are wild at heart and we must remember for our protection and theirs that they are not human and not capable of discerning what we think is right and what is wrong. That is not their natural state of being. In a moment of stress, your Livi would act to protect you the only way he understands how, and we would be unable to help his victim. I doubt you'd want a classmate dead over what might be a schoolyard feud, and I wouldn't wish such a burden upon you, my girl."

She slouched, tired eyes coming to rest on the table and the full cup sitting there. "What am I supposed to do?" Harriet asked in a quiet, defeated voice. She could find no fault in the Headmaster's logic; Livi often did what Livi wanted with little regard to Harriet's wishes, though they usually could come to some kind of concession. Picturing a scenario wherein she might be in a fight with another student proved difficult, and yet Harriet knew Livi wouldn't hesitate to bite someone attacking her, even if their assault ended up being benign.

"You will need to order him not to attack a student under any circumstance, and I will ask you to leave your familiar in your dormitory from now on. I'm certain we can arrange supervised time with Hagrid, our game keeper, so you and Livi may venture out onto the grounds for fresh air from time to time."

Harriet didn't like it, but Dumbledore could have given worse ultimatums. She simply nodded, still staring at her tea.

The Headmaster took a sip from his own cup before setting it down again with a soft clink. "Why did you not return to the Dursleys this summer?"

The bespectacled witch stiffened and jerked her head just high enough to look at Dumbledore's beard, but she didn't meet his eyes. Instead of answering, she said, "I won't go back." She wanted to sound strong and mature, like a young woman who knew her own mind and had a rational point to make—but Harriet just sounded like a frightened little girl. "I won't!"

"Now, Harriet—."

"I _won't_!" She stood, knees wobbly as a newborn colt's, face gone ghastly pale in the kitchen's wan lighting. She kept thinking about the cupboard of all things, and Harriet wasn't sure why; the Dursleys had been wretched for her entire life, giving her plenty of more unpleasant experiences to draw upon, and yet the cupboard haunted her.

"She doesn't have to," Elara said, sounding far more sure of herself than Harriet did, though Harriet noticed how pale her friend had gone, her eyes not quite meeting the Headmaster's either. "She can stay here, if she wants. I'm technically Head of my family, so she can stay with me."

"Technically you're _nothing,_ Black," Snape said. "By law, your _father_ —." Here he gnashed his teeth and looked somewhat mutinous, though Harriet couldn't say why. " _—_ remains Head of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, and you, merely the _proxy_."

"My father's going to rot in Azkaban for the rest of his life," Elara retorted. "So the 'proxy' bit hardly matters at all, does it? Sir? And I'm emancipated."

Dumbledore interrupted them. "While I applaud your initiative in securing your independence, Miss Black, your emancipation does not extend to Harriet."

"Can I get emancipated?" Harriet asked, perking up.

A resounding 'no' came from all three corners, and Harriet looked at her best friend as if she'd grievously betrayed her. Elara shifted in her chair and explained in an undertone, "What Cygnus did wasn't all strictly…legal. Or repeatable."

"Oh."

"Which brings us back to the main topic of conversation." Dumbledore leveled a serious look in Harriet's direction and she stiffened her spine, chin up. "Returning to the Dursleys."

Before Harriet could say anything, Snape bent forward far enough to mutter, "Headmaster," and Dumbledore turned to meet his Potions Master's open stare. They continued to look silently at one another for a good minute or so while Elara and Harriet watched and waited, both befuddled. _What are they doing?_

Finally, Dumbledore broke away, face harder than before, his thoughts inscrutable in that mysterious way of his.

"Don't make me go back," Harriet softly pleaded. She wouldn't stay if he did, and she didn't want to deceive the Headmaster, not like that, but she wouldn't stay with the Dursleys. "Please, Headmaster."

Dumbledore didn't respond. He gazed at the table instead and stroked fingers through his beard as he turned thoughts through his formidable brain. Snape fidgeted— _actually_ fidgeted—behind the man, flicking leaves from his oily hair. "Miss Black," the older wizard said at last, raising his eyes to Elara's level. "How earnest you are in your hopes of housing Harriet here?"

"Very," she responded, though the surreptitious tugging of her sleeves gave away her nervousness.

The Headmaster let out a sigh, then nodded. "Usually, if one of our esteemed professors discovers a guardian is incapable of caring for their charge, we reach out to the Ministry's Department of Welfare, and they either seek a relative better suited for child care or find a family willing to accept a new ward. However, your case is not…usual, Harriet."

Her mind flashed back to the last time she'd sat in the Headmaster's office, Quirrell's body covered in a white sheet, her scar still burning and itching despite Madam Pomfrey's topical cream on her skin, Dumbledore sad and remorseful as he told her just what really happened that Hallowe'en almost eleven years ago.

"Because…because you think staying with Muggles, with the Dursleys, makes me safer."

"Yes," he replied, watching her. Harriet had yet to retake her seat. "Forgive me, my girl; I expressed my wishes to your aunt and uncle that night you lost your parents and asked them to raise you as their own, providing them a stipend and explaining you would, no matter their arguments, be coming to Hogwarts when you turned eleven. The fault for your treatment at Number Four lies with me; I should have checked on your situation myself, or sent someone in my confidence. For that, I apologize."

Harriet stared at her shoes and awkwardly shuffled. She wanted to be angry at Professor Dumbledore, wanted to be furious that he'd sent her to live with the Dursleys, but she couldn't muster the feeling. Maybe she'd be able to if he decided she had to go _back_ there, especially if he _knew_ what happened, but truly she reserved that kind of emotion for Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon. It was their fault, not Dumbledore's.

"Your mother's sacrifice placed very powerful wards upon your blood, so long as you could call a place of your mother's family home. It is very complicated and esoteric magic—and by that I mean it is really only ever understood by those who devote their lives to its study. We spoke of it before, briefly, but I digress; Voldemort and his compatriots may not be able to reach you so long as you remain with your aunt and uncle, but I cannot accept their treatment of you, and I cannot ask that you return to a place where you are not safe and cared for."

Harriet was so relieved she started to tremble and probably would have ended up flat on the floor if Elara hadn't tugged her back into her seat. _No more Dursleys_ , she thought. _No more cupboard._

Dumbledore suddenly smiled. "Besides, I don't want you to lie to me, Harriet, and I understand ordering you to return and stay with your relatives would force you to do so. I have found in my long acquaintance with Slytherins, that the very best way to ensure a Slytherin tells the truth is to ask of them only things they do not the feel the need to lie about."

Snape, who'd gone eerily silent while Dumbledore spoke, snorted.

"For your safety, Harriet, we cannot go to the Ministry and ask for them to find you a suitable home. It would be best if only a select few were aware of your situation and knew of your whereabouts. So, again, I turn my attention to you, Miss Black. You are very gracious in offering your home to Harriet and I am sure she is immensely grateful; however, Harriet—and you, my dear, regardless of your emancipation—are children, and I cannot in good conscience abandon you to your own devices."

Harriet and Elara exchanged uneasy glances.

"Harriet may stay here for the summer if you accept a few of my conditions. If you cannot accept, we will have to come up with another solution."

"Headmaster," Snape drawled. "Do you think _appropriate_ for her to stay in… _this_ house?"

Harriet didn't know what the man meant by that, though maybe Elara did, because her cheeks flushed with color and Dumbledore ignored Snape yet again. "I would ask that you allow for a guardian of my choosing to room here in order to protect and watch over you both. I would also ask that you allow for certain objects in your home to be rendered inert or removed; you may be surprised to learn I have visited Grimmauld Place in the past, and I've known some of your family to collect harmful Dark objects not suitable to a house with children in residence. I would promise that only trusted individuals would be allowed access to or given knowledge of your home."

Uncomfortable, Harriet fought the sudden urge to bite her nails or fidget with the cold teacup. He was asking too much of Elara—way too much, considering she'd already said Harriet could stay here, that she'd opened the door when Harriet showed up in the dead of night, nattering on about wizards out to get her—.

"Okay, sir," Elara said, cutting off Harriet's wayward thoughts. She actually looked a bit relieved, then Harriet remembered the biting shoes and decided Elara would be pleased to have someone with a usable wand who could take care of nonsense like that. "That'll be fine."

"Excellent." Dumbledore gently smacked the palm of his hand against the table instead of clapping in approval. "I do believe that is all we have to discuss at the present, unless you have any questions?"

Harriet and Elara shook their heads.

"Very well, then." The Headmaster rose and straightened his robes. He turned with deliberate effort to the face the Potions Master, who froze when Dumbledore's blue eyes fell upon him. "I do hope you enjoy your stay, Severus."

 _"What_?!" the three of them exclaimed at once—though not as loudly as Snape, who looked very near having some sort of fit. "Really now, Albus—."

"I can think of no one better suited."

" _Albus_ —."

Elara's expression made it seem as if she'd swallowed a whole lemon and Harriet wondered if they'd survive the month until the train came to take them back to school. Snape was going to murder them both.

"You deserve a holiday, my boy." The words should've been pleasant enough, but something in the Headmaster's tone and his gimlet eye brought the three of them up short, Snape pressing his mouth into a firm, furious line as Professor Dumbledore stared him down. Harriet didn't know what Snape had done, but she didn't fancy being in his shoes at the moment. "Enjoy it."

He stepped up to the Floo, took a pinch of silvery powder from the dish on the mantel, and tossed it into the grate. Dumbledore said, "I'll be in touch," as the flames rose as green as writhing Slytherin curtains, and he called out, "Hogwarts, Headmaster's office."

In a flash, Professor Dumbledore was gone.

* * *

 **A/N: brnicholas asked a good question: "** **Shouldn't the trace have been removed from [Elara's] wand when she was emancipated?" Imo, or in my head canon, the Trace is a bit like drinking, or smoking. You can be emancipated and in control of your own affairs, but you still can't stroll into a pub and purchase a pint at twelve. Emancipation isn't an answer for everything.**

 **Thank you all for the reviews and comments! I enjoy them immensely! This story's reached 100k views! You guys are amazing! :D**


	50. dinner with a dungeon bat

**_l. dinner with a dungeon bat_**

The fire barely had an opportunity to settle before the two Slytherin girls realized Professor Dumbledore had abandoned them in the kitchen with a fuming Severus Snape.

Harriet glanced at Elara as the Potions Master continued to stare at the hearth, expression blank, though Harriet thought he'd gone paler than usual, the outrage seeming to billow outward from his body like a humid cloud. Elara didn't look nervous like Harriet did; she looked more annoyed, which Harriet guessed the other girl was entitled to. The headmaster _had_ foisted an unwilling house guest onto her.

Snape spun around and both girls jolted in their chairs as if he'd thrown a curse at them. He dipped a hand into one of his many pockets, and Harriet thought they were going to be hexed for _sure_ this time—and yet, Snape didn't pull out his wand. Rather, he held out a closed fist toward Harriet, and when she did little more than stare at him like a frightened bird ready to fly, Snape sighed.

"Don't just sit there like a brain-dead fool— _take_ this, Potter."

Hesitating, Harriet extended her hand, palm up, and Snape opened his fist over it, letting something about the size of a matchbook drop into her grasp. "Oh, hey!" Harriet exclaimed. "It's my trunk—."

She had only a second to move out of the way when Snape flicked his fingers and the trunk returned to its proper size, slamming down on the table with an almighty bang. Harriet glowered as Snape smirked like he was proud of himself, though the look disappeared as swiftly as it'd come when he looked to Elara again.

Both Harriet and Elara gulped.

Snape pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger and mustered some measure of patience—or most likely tolerance—before he dipped his hand back into his pockets, retrieving a battered pocket watch. He considered the watch with a baleful glare, then flicked his wand toward the mantel. The carriage clock there, covered in cobwebs and decidedly older than Harriet great grandparents, suddenly appeared from under its grubby coat and began to tick once more.

"I will return at _seven_ this evening, at which point a bedroom had better have been set aside for my usage, Black."

Elara just glared.

"You will stay in this house—not one _toe_ outside of it—until I've returned. Rest assured, what patience I have has been utterly decimated by the Headmaster, and I've none to spare on you two dunderheads today."

"Err," Harriet asked, still somewhat dazed by the Headmaster's proclamation and the sudden, overwhelming relief of not having to return to the Dursleys. "Where are you going?"

Snape gave her an incredulous look and didn't bother to answer; rather, he walked straight to the hearth, scooped up a handful of Floo Powder, and said an address in such a quiet undertone, neither Elara nor Harriet heard what he'd said. The man disappeared as Dumbledore had—though with considerably more furious cloak snapping.

The soot hadn't had a chance to settle before Elara whacked Harriet's arm. "Ow, hey—!"

"What are you thinking, asking the great bat where he's going? Who _cares_?" She let out an aggravated sigh and sank into her chair again. "Our Headmaster's crazy. Or well on his way to senile; _can_ wizards go senile?"

Harriet shuffled closer to her friend and, uncertain of herself, touched Elara's shoulder. "I'm…sorry," she muttered, eyes on the floor. The Headmaster asked too much of Elara; it wasn't fair for the other girl to not only open her home to Harriet, but to bloody Snape as well—and whoever else Professor Dumbledore deemed necessary to come ferret through the Black family antiques. Harriet didn't like feeling like this; still scared, anxious, unsure if she'd inadvertently destroyed or irrevocably strained the first friendship she'd ever made.

Elara blinked and seemed to drag herself from her darkening mood, meeting Harriet's downcast eyes. "No," she said slowly. "No—I want you to stay here far more than I care about Snape or whatever rubbish the Headmaster thinks needs to be gotten rid of. Honestly, my grandmother cursed everything right down to the nails in the floorboards."

Harriet smiled and the tense mood in the stuffy kitchen lightened. The horrid night prior was catching up with her, all the running through the woods in the dead of the night, tossing and turning in an unfamiliar bed, causing the bespectacled witch to slump against the solid table and let her head drop onto the top of her trunk with a heavy thump.

 _My trunk_.

"Bloody hell," Harriet said aloud.

"If Hermione were here, she'd scold you for saying that."

"Never mind that—my _trunk_ , Elara! I left it in the tent with—you know!"

"And?"

" _And_ Snape just handed it to me! Which means he— _he_ was the one who—!" Found the dead wizard. In the middle of the woods. Merlin.

Neither girl knew what to say to that sentiment, and so, by mutual assent, they ignored it. "Let's take the trunk up before Kreacher tries to help. He's not, um, very _helpful_ , really, when he's in a mood."

The trunk wasn't heavy, not when one took it properly by the handle and thus activated the Featherlight Charm on it. Harriet dragged it up to the third floor where her bedroom and dozing snake waited, first door on the right, with Elara's just past it, the landing and hall also holding a linen closet Elara warned her away from, a study the older girl had been concentrating her efforts on recently, a bath and another bedroom. Harriet glanced at the empty bedroom, then at Elara, brow raised in question.

Elara shook her head. "There's three more bedrooms upstairs and quarters in the attic. He can take one of those—or sleep with Kreacher in the boiler room. Whatever he'd prefer."

Harriet snorted, though a strain of guilt plucked at her middle; Dumbledore said " _the matter"_ had been " _taken care of_ ," but what did the Headmaster mean by that? If Snape had her trunk, did that mean _he_ had to…to _take care_ of _it_? The sudden image of Professor Snape digging a grave with a shovel like in the movies filled Harriet's head and struck her dumb for a moment—not because it was terribly _difficult_ to imagine Snape of all people digging a grave, but because he was doing it to hide a body _Harriet's_ familiar had killed.

The headmaster never did say who had threatened her.

"Harriet?"

"Hmm?"

"Will you help me with…something?"

Harriet was already nodding before she asked what Elara needed her to do. In answer, Elara turned heel and they marched back out of Harriet's dusty bedroom and down to the second floor, entering a dim, hushed library.

"Be careful," Elara said as she turned the switch for the gas lamps. "Cygnus told me those volumes there, on the higher shelf, are dangerous."

Considering everything from the furniture to the shoes seemed to be dangerous in the house, Harriet paid particular attention to the shelves Elara indicated and stayed well away. Whatever those books did, Harriet didn't want to know. "What're we doing in here?"

The taller witch stopped in front of the hearth and sharply rapped on the frame of a portrait depicting a distinguished, snoozing wizard with a pointy beard and sharp, slanted eyebrows. A thunderous snort escaped him as he woke.

"Er—?! What's this—?! Brats! Don't you know better than to leave a man to his rest?!"

"Where are the family grimoires?" Elara asked of the wizard, her voice level but brooking no argument.

The wizard narrowed his eyes. "Now why would you be looking for those?"

"Because Uncle Cygnus told me they were in here and that they've been in the family since before we _were_ a family." Elara sounded testy even to Harriet's ears. Today was already proving trying to them both. "I need to move them."

"And why's that?"

While Elara bickered with the wizard—a Black ancestor apparently—Harriet studied the portrait and tried to puzzle out where she'd seen the man before. It must have been at Hogwarts, considering the castle contained hundreds upon hundreds of old portraits and moving paintings, and yet Harriet could've sworn….

"Are you—," she interrupted, blushing. "Aren't you a headmaster?"

The wizard's distinct brow rose. "I was indeed," he sniffed, nose in the air, doing a close impression of Malfoy. "Phineas Nigellus Black—the most hated Headmaster to ever grace Hogwarts." He seemed particularly proud of that achievement.

Elara tutted. "I guess we've established how Professor Dumbledore knew you were here, Harriet."

Professor Black huffed but didn't deny the claim.

"The Headmaster wants to have someone sweep the house for Dark objects; I mean to move the grimoires somewhere safe," Elara explained, a hint of color in her cheeks as she admitted the less than legal state of her family's old magic. "The rest I don't care about, considering it either tries to eat, bite, strangle, or stab anyone who touches it."

"Strangle—?!"

"The curtains in the trophy room are strongly hexed."

"You've a _trophy_ room—?"

"As enlightening as this conversation is," Professor Black drawled, doing a damnable impression of Professor Snape at his silkiest. "You're boring me. The grimoires are kept on the next aisle over, in a black trunk. Or so they were the last I saw them. Do be careful, brat—and if you're looking for a place to hide them, may I recommend the safe in the first floor lavatory? It is warded against…curious eyes."

The pair of witches found the trunk in question, though it proved far too heavy for them to lift off the shelf, let alone carry down to the lower level. Elara summoned Kreacher and he helped them levitate the heavy, sealed trunk down the stairs—though twice he leered at Harriet and muttered something about dropping the box on her feet.

It took the better part of an hour pressing and pulling and tapping about the cramped, dingy loo for Elara to find the large panel safe hidden behind a glamored section of tiles. Inside, they discovered a cache of Galleons, several snoring portraits of dour Black ancestors, what looked like three petrified heads, and a glittering centipede preserved in a jar. The girls spent another twenty minutes devoted to hefting the trunk inside the vault, followed by much sweating on Harriet's part and a bout of wheezing from Elara.

They tromped upstairs afterward and made a trifling attempt to clean Harriet's new room, though both witches were tired after their eventful evening and thus spent much of their time chatting and poking about through various cupboards. They broke for lunch around midday, then spent the remainder of the afternoon on the fourth floor, in a filthy game room smelling of mold and dead things. They played chess on a board where the enchanted pieces screamed bloody murder as they died. Elara soundly beat Harriet twice before they couldn't stomach the racket anymore.

At half-past six, Harriet and Elara headed back downstairs, walking side by side down the dim-lit hall to the creaking stairs.

"Where do you think Snape went today?" Harriet asked.

"I would guess he went to argue more with the headmaster," Elara replied, mouth twisting in a repressed grimaced. "I doubt he was successful."

Snape was not, in fact, successful with any further negotiations. At precisely seven in the evening, the carriage clock chimed and a heavy knock struck the front door loud enough to be heard in the kitchen basement. Both witches shared spooked looks, not quite forgetting Harriet's escape from the woods and the wizards chasing her, and so Elara sent Kreacher to open the door and let Snape in—if it was indeed Snape standing out on the porch. The wizard came stalking into the room some minutes later, a decidedly unhappy look on his severe face.

"Potter, what are you doing?" he demanded once he spotted the short witch standing at the cooker, and Harriet—leaning over the pot with her sleeves rolled back past her skinny elbows—eyed him with a puzzled look.

"Err—making supper? Sir?"

"Black, is there a reason you've set Potter to work instead of using your _house-elf_?"

Elara, setting out bowls on the table, frowned at Snape. "You can eat Kreacher's cooking if you want. I wouldn't recommend it," she said. When Snape narrowed his eyes, she swallowed and muttered, "Professor," before hastily setting out the spoons.

"And where am I to stay in this mouldering ruin?"

"There's, um, some bedrooms on the fourth level not in use. Sir."

Snape dropped into the chair at the head of the table and Elara nudged one of the bowls closer to him. When the Potions Master didn't react, she added a spoon and a cup to his setting and retreated into the kitchen.

"Unbearable grump," she muttered as she dropped a cutting board onto the counter and set in on slicing apart a loaf of bread. Harriet snorted, and both girls ducked their heads when Snape directed a sour glare in their direction.

Supper was finished soon, and while Elara set out the bread, Harriet brought the pot to the table and dished herself some stew. Elara served herself next, and then Snape, the three settling in to eat in awkward silence. Harriet had seen Snape eat in the Great Hall, of course, but she found it rather disconcerting to witness the event at such proximity. It was hard to think that any of her professors did boring, normal things like eat, or sleep, or exist anywhere outside the confines of Hogwarts.

The silence broke when Livius—smelling food—nudged open the basement door and came slithering into the room, startling Snape and Elara so badly the latter knocked over her water glass. Snape flicked his wand and cleared the mess before she could react.

" _Sss.._." the serpent hissed as he raised himself into Harriet's lap and proceeded to sniff her food. " _What isss thisss?_ "

" _My dinner_ ," Harriet replied, dunking a heel of bread into the stew. Livi nosed the bowl hard enough to slop some onto the table and she cursed around a mouthful of food. " _Hey!_ "

Livi snapped up a piece of meat and swallowed it whole. " _Sss…don't likesss_."

" _Well, it wasn't meant for you!_ " Harriet growled, tugging on his horn, earning a miffed hiss in reply.

"Potter!"

Snape's exclamation brought Harriet's attention back to her tablemates. Elara was paler than usual, and Snape sat stiffly in his chair, knuckles white around his spoon, and Harriet guessed watching her tussle with a large, venomous snake was a bit off-putting.

"What?" she asked. "He's being a brat."

"Tell your pet to leave while we are _eating_."

Harriet sighed, wiping her mouth on her stretched out sleeve. " _The professor wants you to go while we're eating._ "

Livi seemed disinclined to do as told and said as much, prompting a quick, furtive argument between witch and snake that ended with said snake leaving in a huff, though not before trailing over Professor Snape's boots. He stiffened and scowled at Harriet until Livi disappeared. Several minutes passed before the man moved.

"Regardless of the headmaster's mandate, I haven't the time—nor the desire—to babysit you two miscreants for the remainder of the summer. He's arranged for various minders during the day, and I will be here in the evenings. If you wake me, you had best be dying or prepared to do so. Am I understood?"

"Yes, sir," the two witches grumbled in reply, though the question was certainly a rhetorical one.

"You are not to leave this house without Dumbledore's chosen babysitter."

Elara scowled and opened her mouth, then thought better of what she meant to say when she caught Snape's eye. Harriet slurped her stew and their combined wordless condemnation prompted her to set the bowl back on the table and blush, fidgeting with her spoon.

Seeming to not know what else to say, the Potions Master curled his lip and strode from the room, leaving his half-eaten meal behind. The door snapped closed at his heels and Elara let out a puff of air, slouching in her chair. Harriet resumed her own dining.

"I can't believe we have to spend the rest of the summer with him," Elara muttered, head in her hands. "God help us both."

Harriet slurped her stew.


	51. slytherin games

**_li. slytherin games_**

Hermione stared at the grim rocaille on the ceiling and released a gusty sigh.

Despite the Charms inlaid into the parlor walls, August's heat still seeped inside and filled most of the residents with a warm, sleepy lassitude. She said _most_ and not _all_ because Draco, like the majority of twelve-year-old boys, was an endless turbine of potential energy even on the hottest and stuffiest of days, and when Greg and Vincent couldn't come over, the Malfoy scion had taken to following Hermione around and pestering the daylights out of her.

Hermione huffed. _I don't know why he can't harass Jaime_ , she thought. _If I could get away with hexing him, I would!_

She lay with her back pressed against the unyielding metal balcony, her robes bundled up in an impromptu pillow behind her head, a thick volume on topical potions open and forgotten against her middle. Frankly, Hermione was bored of studying. She loved reading, but the Malfoy library leaned toward dubious, dry tomes, and spending almost every day ensconced in the Manor with her nose buried in a ponderous book got dull even for a girl like her. There were only so many pages on the viscosity of pureed webcaps and speculations on orellanin viability Hermione could read before her eyes started to glaze.

It was lovely outside, if hot. She would rather swallow her own tongue than admit to any Malfoy how beautiful she found their home, the lush grounds hemmed in yew hedges, the gardens bursting with wild, delicate flora from remote locales, the antique furnishings all crafted by hand or wand by Wizarding craftsmen or Malfoy ancestors. She stared at the railing quite near her face and marveled at how all the fine, intricate whorls had been formed and set by spells instead of by hammers and fire.

The balcony itself was part of the library, though it extended past the library confines and above the neighboring parlor—the Yellow Room, Hermione thought it was called, though most of the walls were paneled in old, oiled oak with only small stretches of visible bricks painted pale chartreuse here and there. The Malfoys only occasionally visited the library itself as far as Hermione knew, and she'd never seen anyone aside from herself utilize the upper balcony. It made for an excellent, if boring, place to hide.

Hermione wrapped her arms around the book and huffed again. She'd had no letters from Elara or Harriet, not that she was terribly surprised by this, not when she could barely write to them herself, or to her own parents. She missed her mum and dad a great deal, and yet Hermione wished to speak with her friends more than with her family, veritably bursting with magical curiosity as she was, a curiosity her parents wouldn't—couldn't—understand.

Voices drifted in the distance. Hermione dozed, thinking about mushrooms and home, a Slytherin green dorm room beneath a lake and the cool common room lit by silver lanterns—until the voices drew nearer and Hermione shook off the daze just as the door into the Yellow Room popped open.

"—Draco, of course, is looking forward to Potions next year. He was tutored by Lucius as a boy, you know—and he speaks highly of your management style in the classroom."

"I imagine he's more enthralled by the idea of joining the Quidditch team than he is by my curriculum, Narcissa," a familiar baritone drawled. Stiffening, Hermione rolled onto her side and peeked into the parlor below, watching as Mrs. Malfoy—draped in summery, robin's egg blue robes—came sauntering in, followed by the ominous presence of Professor Snape.

 _What is he doing here?_

"Can I interest you in something to drink?" Mrs. Malfoy asked as she sank into one of the armchairs and Snape sat on the opposing sofa, not bothering to remove his outer robes. _Must not be here for long, then._ "Tea? Or perhaps something stronger?"

"Tea would be adequate."

Mrs. Malfoy simpered and called for Dobby, ordering the nervous house-elf to deliver a tea service. He did so, and Draco's mother used two delicate swishes of her wand to pour the Potions Master's drink and levitate the cup into his long-fingered hands. Snape pressed the rim to his lips, but Hermione could tell from her vantage that he didn't drink anything.

"It's been too long since your last visit, Severus. I suppose the old fool keeps you busy throughout the holidays."

"Exceedingly so," the professor replied, setting his cup and saucer down upon the coffee table. "When other…individuals aren't demanding my attention."

The subtlest of ticks touched Mrs. Malfoy's face and she upturned her nose. "Indeed." She sipped tea with practiced grace. "One has to wonder _whose_ business brought you to our door today."

"Allow me to be plain and allay your fears; I am here to ask you for a personal favor, Narcissa."

Hermione shifted, rustling slightly, and Snape's vaguely avian profile twitched in her direction, the sunlight coming through the window playing over his face, deepening those strange scars surrounding his left eye and brow. He moved again, ducking from the light, and Hermione held her breath until the wizard resumed faux-drinking his tea.

"A _favor_?" Mrs. Malfoy asked, her mouth tipping into a very smug grin. "Well now I _am_ intrigued."

"A favor for your family, I should specify."

"For the family?" The witch quirked a brow and drank her tea, little finger extended with perfect ease. "How charitable. Are you certain you're not here for Lucius?"

"No, I'm certain Lucius' attentions are best spent…elsewhere."

Hermione frowned in thought as she peered down at the two Slytherin alumni, watching as they traded seemingly innocuous comments, all the while circling a point of conversation Hermione hadn't yet grasped. If Snape meant to ask for a favor for the Malfoys—a concept that confused the young witch in its redundancy—wouldn't he want to speak with Draco's father? But what was it he had said? ' _A favor for your family_.' That could mean the Malfoys, certainly, and yet it could mean something else entirely; after all, Narcissa had not been _born_ a Malfoy.

Mrs. Malfoy set down her own cup on the coffee table. "Oh?"

"How often do you brush off your copy of _Etiquette and Artifice_?" Professor Snape folded his hands together and leaned forward.

"Often enough, I should say. Darling boy, my Draco, but Lucius lets him run wild—." She paused and considered the wizard. "Why do you ask?"

"I have been charged with two wards, so to speak. Scions of old families." He smirked when Mrs. Malfoy's interest visibly piqued. "As I've not the time nor the inclination to play nursemaid, other…minders have been arranged by invested parties. I simply mean to make certain at least one such individual is outside a certain purview and more amenable to a Slytherin mindset."

Hermione's brain whirred as quickly as Mrs. Malfoy's, the two people in the parlor falling into a stilted silence as the Malfoy matriarch turned over the Potions Master's words and Hermione did the same.

"And this would be a…favor _for_ my family?"

"Indeed."

 _Black!_ The name pinged off the inside of Hermione's skull and she nearly gasped aloud. _Of course! Draco's mother is a Black by blood, making them_ her _family! If Professor Snape is talking about a pure-blood scion in the Black family, he must mean Elara. But why ever would he be minding her? And who is the second person he mentioned?_

Mrs. Malfoy crossed her legs with an elegant flutter of silk and leaned into her chair, seemingly at ease in her own parlor, playing Slytherin word games like the conversation was little more than an afternoon jaunt on the lawn. "How very interesting. Poor boy, this hardly seems a favor."

"The favor would be asking you not to inform Lucius," he scoffed. "And to bring that bloody book."

Mrs. Malfoy laughed. "You must exaggerate, dear Severus. I've met the girl, you know, and she isn't so wickedly terrible."

"You've not met the other."

 _Who is he talking about?_ Hermione growled in frustration. _Who besides Elara? A pure-blood heir—but wait! You're an idiot, Hermione Granger! He said old families, not pure-bloods! Is he talking about Harriet, then? Is Harriet with Elara_? If they were speaking of that stuffy book on wizarding etiquette Mrs. Malfoy tutored her and Draco out of, then Professor Snape _must_ mean Harriet. Hermione let out a silent sigh at the thought of the younger girl's table manners—all elbows and unwieldy knife action. _Her relatives are horrid people._

"Hmm. Perhaps I will consider the arrangement."

Hermione rolled her eyes. _Rubbish._ It wasn't really a favor at all; Professor Snape was asking Mrs. Malfoy to mind Elara and Harriet like she minded Hermione and Draco, which would give the Malfoy matriarch influence over the current Black proxy, even if only a smidgen, though Hermione had serious doubts if Elara would allow even that much. The Malfoys were not a family who overlooked what clout they were afforded in any magical affairs, and Mrs. Malfoy wasn't going to pass up this opportunity, not when it could later reflect poorly on the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, and thus reflect poorly on Narcissa as well.

There were always layers upon layers to the interactions of Slytherins.

Her hands itched with the need to write a letter to her friends. What was _happening_ out there in the wider world? Hermione hated feeling so stifled, kept isolated and ignorant, while events transpired beyond the manor walls. Something significant must have occurred if Professor Snape was minding Harriet; had the Headmaster removed her from her relatives? If he had, then why had she been placed in Snape's care? Or, as she assumed, thrown into the man's hands and promptly shuffled into someone else's? Was Harriet staying with Elara? Were they in danger? Would she be foisted off into a pure-blood family for mentorship like Hermione?

 _No,_ the bushy-haired girl surmised. _That's why the professor doesn't want Lucius to know. He doesn't want word trickling down to the Ministry, and the Headmaster won't want Harriet foisted into potentially dangerous hands._

"I'll have to consult my schedule. I'm terribly busy, especially in the summers, with Draco home—and I _do_ mean to keep him close during the holidays. I wish Hogwarts would allow students to come home during the weekends. Surely you could slip a word to that old fool—?"

Mrs. Malfoy paused mid-word and gazed into the middle distance, snapping back to herself just as swiftly as she had drifted off, hand pausing above her drink. "Lucius is home." Hermione grimaced and guessed Draco's mum must have felt the wards shifting from her back to the head of the household. "I'll go and gather him. It really has been too long since your last visit, Severus. Lucius will be glad to see you."

She rose and disappeared with the sharp click of heels, and Hermione laid still on the upper balcony, watching the Potions Master's countenance slide from snide superiority to a tired grimace, then to nothing at all, his expression like opaque glass she could see nothing through. _I should leave_ , Hermione decided as she nibbled on her lip. _Before Mr. Malfoy shows up. Heaven help me if_ he _catches me eavesdropping…._

Another glance into the parlor showed that the dark wizard had vanished without a sound, which shouldn't have surprised Hermione, given how Professor Snape glided through Hogwarts' corridors like a sure-footed cat harrying his prey, yet did so all the same. Swallowing, she made up her mind and quickly rolled onto her knees, yanking her wrinkled robes on over her arms before plucking the heavy book up from the balcony floor. Hermione made her way through the open portal between the walls and hustled into the library proper, letting out a small breath of relief as she reached the iron ladder and started down.

 _I probably won't get to hear what happened until September_ , Hermione groused as she held onto the railing with her free hand and clasped the book under her arm with the other. _It's not as if I could write and ask, even if I could send a letter. That'd be terribly irresponsible and, well, stupid of me if I went about probing into Elara's business and brought it to Malfoy's attention. I hope Harriet's all right. What could have possibly happened to have her removed from her family? Why would Snape risk Mrs. Malfoy telling her husband just to have her watch them?_

Hermione hopped off the last step. She turned—and let out a breathless shriek when she found herself standing before the looming Potions Master.

"Oh, you—you scared me, Professor!" she said, blood draining from her face. Why was he in the library? When had he gotten there?

He smirked, the same half-crooked simper he delivered right before verbally eviscerating a misbehaving student in his classroom and Hermione felt her blood run cold. "Did you hear anything… _interesting,_ Miss Granger?"

"I-interesting, sir?"

"Yes, _interesting_ , girl. Do you hear anything you might…think to repeat?"

Hermione clutched the thick tome to her chest like a shield and shook her head. "N-no, Professor. I—I was just studying. I fell asleep in the rows. Didn't hear anything at all."

The wizard wasn't convinced of the lie, of course, but he did give a single, affirming jerk of his chin before he swept back under the mezzanine and to the parlor's closed door. Hermione didn't move until he disappeared from sight, and a moment later she could hear the faint drone of Lucius Malfoy's unctuous voice greeting the man.

She made good on her escape while she could and all but ran from the room.


	52. the tree that flourishes

**_lii. the tree that flourishes_**

It took Elara a long time to fall asleep the first night Snape stayed in Grimmauld Place.

Though the wizard taught at her school, he was—for all intents and purposes—a stranger, a silent, sharp-tongued intruder whom Elara had threatened only weeks before, a stranger who now had unfettered access to her home. She didn't sleep well in proximity to strangers, those first few weeks at Hogwarts made less difficult by the presence of other similarly aged girls, but ever since the orphanage, ever since they came for her in the dead of night and dragged her from her bed, Elara had been a light sleeper. She stared at the ceiling every time the floorboards overhead creaked and didn't nod off until well after midnight.

As such, her mood was less than pleasant at breakfast, where she and Harriet ate food prepared by a Hogwarts house-elf named Rikkety, who'd been deputized by Snape to bring their meals from the castle. They saw no sign of the Potions Master that morning, and once the dishes were cleared and their familiars fed, they found themselves waiting restlessly by the Floo for their first minder to step through.

Said minder didn't so much as step through the Floo as come barreling out and collide with Harriet, collapsing into a heap of soot, swears, and bent elbows.

"Oh, _shite_! I'm so sorry!" the pink-haired witch cried as she leapt to her feet and dragged Harriet upright, nearly dropping the dazed girl again in the process of smacking ash from her robes. "I really did think I had it that time, but I must've turned at the last minute. Figures, I'm dead clumsy—but there you are! Good as new!"

Elara stared at the witch—Nymphadora, her second cousin, who hated being called Nymphadora—and right at her heels the fire blazed green again, admitting the familiar figure of Nymphadora's pretty mum, Andromeda.

"Hello again," the older woman greeted, entering the room with far more aplomb than her daughter. "It's nice to see you well, Elara."

Elara answered her with a tight-lipped nod, suspicious of Andromeda's presence, and wondered if the Headmaster had an alternative motive for asking her here. She introduced Harriet, and was again introduced to Nymphadora— "Tonks!"—before they migrated to the living room on the second floor.

Tonks proved as clumsy as promised, and Elara was surprised to learn that, as unlikely as it seemed, she was a promising new recruit in the Aurory. "I spend most of my time shadowing a mad bugger named Alastor Moody," she explained as they poked about through the ruined furniture. "Told him I had a family emergency today, so he let me off."

"He's going to be displeased if he finds out you lied to him, Dora," Andromeda said from her spot on her conjured chair.

"You'd get tired of him too, mum, if he kept shouting 'CONSTANT VIGILANCE!' at you through the loo door."

Harriet laughed outright and Elara smirked, settling farther into her spot on the dusty sofa by Andromeda. Tonks was invaluable in picking out what was and wasn't cursed in the room while her mum set the furniture back to rights, the witch proficient in the kind of household magic neither Elara or Harriet had seen at Hogwarts yet. _It probably isn't taught there,_ she mused. _It's probably something passed on from mother to daughter through the generations._

She felt a small pang of loss at that thought.

Elara watched as Andromeda drew her wand over old wood and torn cushions, returning luster and tying together loose threads as dust lifted into the air and vanished out of sight. Bit by bit, the room emerged from its own ruin; the afternoon wore on and the strange witches who'd invaded her home returned Elara's living space to something of its former glory. To be sure, the defunct wallpaper needed to be stripped, the floors refinished, and the antique chairs reupholstered, but she could see something _livable_ in it now.

A tapestry of the Black family hung on the wall near the hearth, larger than any single tapestry really had the right to be, moth-eaten at the edges and riddled with charred holes, like someone had taken a cigarette to certain branches and burned them off. Andromeda came to stand before it, and when she shooed Tonks and Harriet from the room to see about lunch, Elara stood next to her, since the witch's ploy to get the others out of the room wasn't lost on her.

"Aunt Walburga was overly dramatic for most of her life," Andromeda sniffed, dark eyes flickering over the ruined tree. "She was fanatical about family, right up until they disappointed her. She took it upon herself to 'prune' certain people and keep our House…pure." Andromeda pointed her wand at one mark, whispered a spell and twisted her wrist, pulling back like a tailor threading a needle. Before their eyes, the burned edges spun new fibers, coming together until the name ' _Andromeda Gallatea Black-Tonks_ ' came into view. She spun her wand again, and two new branches crept from the scroll bearing her moniker, one for her husband and one for her Metamorphmagus daughter.

Andromeda turned to Elara, a soft, sad smile on her winsome face, and Elara blinked, unsure of what to make of her regard. "Muggles have an expression about being able to choose your friends, but not your relatives."

"I know," Elara replied. "I was raised with Muggles."

"Were you?"

"Yes." She said nothing more on the subject.

Andromeda nodded once, then corrected another flaw on the tapestry, revealing ' _Marius Cygnus Black_ ' between Pollux and Dorea Black. From Dorea spilled another cluster, expanding the tapestry, the tree growing and twisting like a living thing, making way for Charlus Potter, then Fleamont and Euphemia, James and Lily, and finally ' _Harriet Dorea Potter_.'

Elara brushed her fingertips over the name and if Andromeda noticed, she said nothing. She regrew other sections and the tapestry flourished, the whole of it shifting until one burned hole came to the center, to the head of the tree, and Andromeda returned Sirius Black's name, added Marlene McKinnon, and then Elara's own.

 _I wonder if everyone in the Black family knows how to do this. Do they have their own tapestries at home?_

"Did you move the grimoires?"

Elara started, eyes wide as she faced the woman. "Excuse me?"

"You moved the family grimoires, did you not?" When Elara didn't reply, Andromeda nodded. "Good. I would recommend taking them to Gringotts. Dora or myself can accompany you, if you wish."

"…why?" Elara asked, confused. Dumbledore had said he wanted to remove or neutralize anything dangerous in the house, which would definitely include the grimoires. Why would Andromeda offer to help hide them? "Didn't Professor Dumbledore ask you get to rid of things like those?"

"Professor Dumbledore asked me to help watch over you and Harriet, with the warning that you were quite resentful of needing adult supervision because of your emancipation." Andromeda chuckled when Elara glared. "The Headmaster himself is a half-blood, but he understands something of pure-blood eccentricity and the nature of our…histories. The family may have descended into bigotry and madness, but it needn't stay there; you are the Head of the House of Black now, Elara, and under your direction it will either flourish and thrive in the new millennium, or it will die. That said, growing does not mean forgetting one's roots or destroying your beginning, and Albus understands that."

Andromeda reached out to tuck wayward strands of hair behind Elara's ear and brush dust from her cheek. Elara bore the touch, though she knew Andromeda must sense her hesitancy.

"I may have been disowned when I married a Muggle-born, but Ted is…gone now, because of the Minister's laws. The Blacks are my family, for all that I wished I could sometimes choose my relatives differently. I believe the Headmaster asked for me to watch over you and little Harriet because while he cannot condone our old magics, not in the presence of impressionable children, he doesn't wish to strip your identity from you—or from Harriet, who doesn't have any family left now, aside from you."

Andromeda twirled her wand, whispering the proper incantation, and the tree moved once more to bring the Potter branch of the family nearer her own, both Elara and Harriet nearer the top, like the fresh, new growth of a real tree, full of potential to bring the branches higher still, or break and splinter with rot.

"I'm not an official member of Albus'…group, but I have been informed something of Harriet's past and the hardships she faces. There's a lot of weight on her shoulders, and there's also a lot of weight on yours. The Blacks are the oldest magical family in the kingdom, and people will look to you to model how pure-blood families are meant to carry themselves in the coming years. It's a burden I ran away from, because while I love my husband and my sisters, I was also eager to marry outside the family and distance myself from the politics. You don't have that option. You will have to be strong, for your own good, for Harriet's, and for the rest of us as well."

Elara swallowed, lowered her eyes, and nodded. _Strong_. Elara didn't know if she was _strong_ so much as determined, and that determination had gotten her away from St. Giles', had returned her to the House of Black, had seen her through Cygnus' death and her first year at Hogwarts. It had steadied her through the revelation that her father was a madman who'd betrayed her best friend's mum and dad, a man who'd made Harriet a target of the Darkest wizard alive.

She hoped it would see her through more trials yet.

Andromeda touched her again, a light pat on the shoulder, before she turned away. "I'll just go check on those two and make sure Dora hasn't broken what's left of the china."

Andromeda left, and Elara remained behind, lost deep in thought as she studied the restored Black tapestry and considered the witch's words.


	53. when opportunity knocks

**_liii. when opportunity knocks_**

The following days set a precedence for what Harriet and Elara expected for the rest of their summer. In the morning, they woke to a warm breakfast served by Rikkety, a house-elf whom Kreacher hated on principle and whom also doted on Harriet with a worried, frantic energy neither witch could properly guess the source of. After breakfast, they cleared their dishes, then waited to see who would be stepping through the Floo.

On the second day, they met Emmeline Vance, a stately looking Ravenclaw in her mid-fifties with an emerald shawl draped over her shoulders, and rather than staying in the house to clean, the witch snuck them out to watch a professional Quidditch game at the hidden arena in the Northumberland forests. Harriet didn't think Elara had much interest in Quidditch at all, but Harriet was enthralled, watching the players soar like hawks overhead, cheering on the Warwick Warriors against the Appleby Arrows for the sport of it.

Professor McGonagall came through the Floo on the third day, which made Harriet and Elara both uneasy at first. While the Transfiguration professor wasn't partisan like Professor Snape, she was more distantly polite with Slytherins than she was with other Houses, and the severe witch herself didn't seem to know what to make of them when she entered Grimmauld Place. Harriet doubted she'd ever been asked to babysit Slytherins before.

She thawed over the day's course, finding an easy camaraderie with Elara, who excelled in Transfiguration and had dozens upon dozens of questions about Animagi, while Harriet, with her general lack of off-putting Slytherin guile, earned softer affection from the stern professor. Harriet wondered if McGonagall had liked her parents, both Gryffindors, and if that residual fondness made it easier for her to like Harriet, too. Sometimes the bespectacled witch remembered the Hat had almost placed her in the House of Lions, and sometimes she wondered how her life would have turned out if it had.

They got Snape on the fourth day—or, rather, Snape was in the house on the fourth day, clearing out the potions lab in the basement, the one connected to the kitchen through the scorched, battered door, and he told them to leave him be unless they were poisoned, bleeding, on fire, or otherwise incapacitated. So, Harriet and Elara played chess and poked about the library, looking for tomes Elara might wish to hide away or anything Hermione would be interested in reading. Harriet found a book of jinxes she wished she could try on Pansy or Longbottom.

The fifth day saw them out in the magically enlarged yard with genial Professor Sprout, tackling the wild and—frankly—lethal foliage that had grown unchecked over the decades, the stone fountain choked with algae, the shed consumed by crawlers, the greenhouse bursting with the kinds of plants one needed a machete to tame. True to form, Elara killed half of what she touched, and Professor Sprout set her to pulling weeds, tutting all the while.

Headmaster Dumbledore came the next day and didn't stay for the entirety of the afternoon, only through lunch. Elara muttered about him probably wanting to comb through the house himself, but the venerated wizard expressed little interest in exploring and instead returned the kitchen to its pristine state with a flourish of his wand, inviting both girls to sit down for tea. He inquired after their time at Grimmauld and questioned Harriet further about the Dursleys, which she answered begrudgingly, and about the woods, the memory of which still terrified her. He asked to meet Livi, and on the way upstairs to find the irascible serpent, the portrait of Elara's grandmother started screaming filth at the Headmaster when they passed her landing. Elara flushed a brilliant shade of crimson, but Dumbledore simply shrugged and conjured a pair curtains over her frame.

On the seventh day, both witches woke and tromped down the stairs together, wondering who they might meet or see today.

"D'you think it'll be another professor?" Harriet asked as they sat at the table and Rikkety came bobbing out of the kitchen, bowls of porridge and fresh fruit balanced on her head. They took their meals with quiet "thank you"s, which sent Rikkety into delighted squeals that didn't taper off until she disappeared.

"I would assume they're too busy to watch us," Elara replied after swallowing the first bite. "Term will begin in just a few weeks, and they need to prepare just like we do."

"Maybe Madam Vance will come back." Harriet perked up, remembering the match and the general excitement of being among so many other witches and wizards. "She was nice."

Elara smirked. "You just want to watch more Quidditch."

Grumbling, Harriet spooned porridge into her mouth, though she didn't deny the claim. She'd also be pleased if Andromeda and Tonks came back, since she thought stories from Tonks' job at the Ministry were exciting. "As long as it's not Snape again. It's not _our_ fault that old cauldron attacked him. He knows most everything's bloody cursed in the house." Said cauldron left a livid welt on the man's jaw when the iron lid apparently flung itself at him like a discus. Snape had been absolutely foul throughout dinner.

"It might be Dumbledore again."

"Really? I thought he'd be more busy than anyone else."

"No one has touched the library yet. I know he wants to; where else would you find Dark magic if not in books _about_ Dark magic?"

"You mean like that little green book with the snake on it that you hide in your journal? The one with the _Ignis Monstrum_ spell in it?"

Elara glared. "Don't tell anyone about that."

"I'm not going to," Harriet replied as she raised her hands in surrender. "But seriously, that spells looks like it could burn down the bloody house."

"We're not allowed to do magic. You know that."

"Doesn't stop it from being dangerous, though."

Whatever comment Elara had in response to that would have to wait, because Kreacher came stumping into the kitchen with a bewildered raven tucked under his arm. He let go of the rumpled black bird and it soared over to Harriet, both witches staring mutely at the strange creature as it stuck out a leg and hopped closer.

" _Harriet Potter_ ," it croaked.

"It talked!" Harriet exclaimed, almost upending her breakfast when she jumped in her chair.

"Ravens are capable of mimicking speech," Elara informed her. For a second, she reminded Harriet of Hermione. "You can speak to snakes, but you're shocked by this?"

"Oh, ha ha," Harriet told her. She noticed the scrap of parchment attached to the raven's leg, and once she pulled it loose, the parchment resized itself into a proper letter and a thin, worn book. The raven vanished in a sudden puff of smoke. "…you're not going to tell me ravens can disappear into thin air on a whim, are you?"

"No, I can't say I am." Elara frowned at the letter in Harriet's hands. "I've never seen a raven deliver post."

"Me neither."

"Perhaps you should wait to open it—?"

Harriet pried the seal free, raising an eyebrow at Elara's miffed expression. "You said there's half a dozen wards on the house screening what gets sent here."

"Yes. Screening _owls_. Not ravens that are obviously Charmed or cursed or hexed to vanish when they've finished their deliveries."

Harriet hummed in acknowledgment as she peeled back the missive's top flap and began to read.

 _Chère Mlle. Potter,_

 _I found myself surprised, yet delighted, to receive your letter this summer. The incident that occurred in regards to a certain object of my possession was an unfortunate event, and I cannot accept your apologies for its loss. I have been made aware of the particulars concerning the attempted theft, and must instead extend my own earnest regrets for what harm you came to whilst my possession was kept at Poudlard. Your defense of its acquisition is admirable, and I am humbled by the concern you have extended on my behalf. You need not worry for myself, or my Perenelle. All will be well._

 _Albus tells me you are a witch with a particular talent for Defense. Please, accept my apologies and the book I have enclosed with this letter. It proved invaluable to me in my boyhood, so many years ago._

 _Respectueusement,_

 _Nicholas Flamel_

 _Gran. Sorc., Prix de Flamel; Première Classe, Alch. Ma., Def. Ma._

"It's from Mr. Flamel," Harriet said, turning the book over so she could study the wrinkled spine.

" _Nicholas_ Flamel?"

"Mhm." Harriet extended her arm across the table and handed the letter over. "I asked Professor Dumbledore if I could write to him so I could apologize about the Stone, and though the headmaster said I didn't need to, I still sent him a letter at the end of term."

"And it took him this long to get back to you?"

Harriet shrugged. "I didn't think he'd reply at all. When you're six hundred something years old, I bet you move a bit slower, right?"

Shaking her head, Elara perused the missive from Flamel while Harriet opened the book and carefully pulled apart the papery vellum. " _Un Guide…Sur la Connaissance des…Ténèbres._ It's in French!" Harriet despaired, flipping through a few more pages, finding them all written in the same flowery, foreign language.

Elara wrinkled her nose in thought. "It's a ' _Guide on…._ ' Something. ' _Understanding the Dark_?' Maybe? I think."

"I didn't know you knew French."

"I don't. ' _Ténèbres'_ is a common enough word in the old library books that I looked it up, and ' _Connaissance'_ has a Latin root."

"You know _Latin_?!"

"Yes. I had to learn it at—. At the place I was, before. Professor McGonagall told us learning the basic forms becomes mandatory this year in Transfiguration. Latin really is imperative to understanding spells."

"God, you sound like Hermione," Harriet groused, slumping her shoulders as she set aside the book so she could concentrate on her breakfast. She felt more than a little stupid; _the_ Nicholas Flamel had sent her a nice letter and a book—but she couldn't read it.

Elara considered the younger witch as she carefully refolded the letter and handed it back. "Hermione knows French," she said slowly. "She'd be delighted to translate it with you."

Glum, Harriet tucked the letter away and shoved a spoonful of porridge into her mouth. Elara was right, of course. Hermione would love to translate an old book that used to belong to _Nicholas Flamel_ , but that didn't stop Harriet from thinking herself helpless and a bit dimwitted. Both Elara and Hermione had helped her study last term to achieve her good marks, and Harriet wished she was more capable on her own.

The Floo flared green, putting an end to her pitying thoughts.

"Two Galleons says it's someone new," Harriet muttered as she pushed her chair back and stood.

"I'm not betting, Harriet."

"Aw, you're no fun."

The fire rose, a sudden gasp of flames transposing from one Floo to the other, and suddenly a slender, unfamiliar witch in bespoke robes appeared before their hearth.

Elara jumped to her feet. "Absolutely not!" she said, brows furrowed. "I did _not_ agree to—!"

"Do not be tiresome," the witch tutted in a posh tone Harriet had come to expect from pure-bloods and their children. "I've been told you're to accept any minder you're assigned, and Severus has asked me here as a _favor_. My time is limited, and you will be on your _best_ behavior."

Elara stiffened, color flaring in her pale cheeks. "I _won't_ go back with you."

"I have not asked you to, impertinent child," the woman snapped. Confused, Harriet looked between the two and almost jumped when the witch rounded on her. The woman was tall and fair, her blond hair light as could be and perfectly coiffed, emeralds dangling on silver clasps from her lobes, gray eyes hard and calculating. Studying the elegant woman, Harriet thought she looked quite like—.

"Malfoy," she sputtered, causing the woman's eyes to narrow farther. "I, um, mean you're Mrs. Malfoy, right? You look like your son."

"Yes, quite." She proffered one dainty hand and Harriet, utterly at a loss for what else to do, took it in her own and shook with the woman. "I am Narcissa Malfoy, and I have been asked to teach you and Miss Black—." She cut a look to a still fuming Elara. "—etiquette. You are?"

"H-Harriet Potter, ma'am."

" _Potter_?" She lifted a perfectly groomed brow, though her face remained otherwise passive. "Oh, Severus is always so careful with his wording…very well. Miss Potter, is this how you dress to greet guests?"

Harriet glanced down at herself, taking in the rumpled school shirt and skirt, having dressed in them today after finding she had little else clean in her trunk. One sleeve was rolled to the elbow, the other left flat and unbuttoned, a bit of porridge on the sleeve, her hair its usual tangle of uncombed locks. "…yes?"

That was not the answer Narcissa Malfoy apparently wanted, and only two flicks of her wand later, Harriet's shirt was tucked in, buttoned correctly, and her wild hair tightly bound in a single plait. "Ow, hey—!"

"Sit down, Miss Potter."

Harriet didn't wish to sit down but she did so anyway, because pissing off a woman who referred to Professor Snape by his first name would only bring the unholy terror of a furious Potions Master down upon their poor heads. Obeying didn't mean Harriet didn't sulk, however.

"I don't need etiquette lessons," Elara snapped, arms crossed over her middle. "I don't _want_ them."

"Don't _want_ them? What a silly thing to say, Miss Black." Mrs. Malfoy smiled and it almost looked genuine. "I'm assured you _need_ the lessons, as your greeting shows a distinct lack of manners, and I had come to expect better of you, cousin. As for _wanting_ , what is the alternative? You don't want to know Wizarding etiquette? You would rather you—and Miss Potter, by default—both remained unsophisticated apes posing as the Heads of old families?" She lowered herself into one of the empty chair with considerable grace, crossing one leg over the other, soothing the skirt of her silk robes. "A good Slytherin knows to take advantage of the opportunities presented to them. Surely my father taught you that."

The muscles in Elara's jaw jumped, and Harriet thought she'd argue with Draco's mum, tell her to bugger off and get them in heaps of trouble with Snape—but then Elara reluctantly nodded and directed her sullen stare at the table as she sank into her own seat.

Again, Mrs. Malfoy smiled, all her teeth perfectly white and straight, her eyes the same gray as Elara's. "Wonderful. I do so _love_ the chance to spend time with family. Now, for your first lesson…."

* * *

 **A/N: I haven't seen the new FB film, which I'm told has Nicholas Flamel in it? I have my own characterization of him in my head that probably won't mesh with the film. That's more important later on. " _Prix de Flamel; Première Classe_ " is my approximation of a French Order of Merlin, and then "Alch. Ma.," for Alchemy Master, "Def. Ma.," for Defense Master.**


	54. on the devil's shoulder

**_liv. on the devil's shoulder_**

Hogwarts' empty halls echoed with a yearning, desperate silence that reflected Severus' every breath and every step with exacting mimicry.

Severus himself yearned for the silence ten months out of every year, more than grateful for what simple measure of peace he could find in the time between the dunderheads' departure and his looming responsibilities. Hogwarts, in contrast, was barren and empty, longing for the return of her children in the fall, and when he brushed his fingertips against the stone wall, he could feel the sentience of a thousand years of magic saturation rippling under his touch, rising, trickling into his palm and mind.

Because Severus, to his chagrin, was very much still a child to a castle older than Merlin himself.

He stood for a time in the shadows between the sunlit cloister windows and drew strength from the castle and the quiet, his dark eyes closed, his thoughts and emotions and memories shifting in the black, frozen depths of his Occluded mind. He sunk some memories deeper into the morass and lifted others, some limned in ice and hoarfrost, decoys to the quiet recesses where dangerous recollections buried themselves deep. Only when the ice extended to the shores of his consciousness did he open his eyes again.

Severus would pay a price for the Occlusion later; _all or nothing_ , Albus had said when he first taught his budding spy how to Occlude and read minds. One cannot simply shift and displace their mental landscape without exacerbating cause and effect; suppressing natural emotion only served to deepen it later, like a Muggle pressure cooker, worsening his predisposition for being a bastard. When his shields thawed, he'd more surly and short-tempered than ever, and Potter and Black would most likely suffer the consequences of his mood at dinner. He could theoretically Occlude through the evening, but should his mind not find equilibrium before sleep, the nightmares would come again.

Severus wagered the brats would rather deal with his usual vitriol than his night terrors bringing down the house.

Rolling his shoulders back, the Potions Master departed the castle's warmth and delved into the dungeons below.

Slytherin wasn't hard to find; he mostly kept to the House from which he'd stolen his namesake, and when the students were gone, he frequented the subterranean common room and sprawled in the same winged armchair by the main hearth, a glass of elf wine in hand, his eyes fixed on the painting of a rowan tree hung above the mantel.

Though the man's time as a student had been far before Severus' own, the Potions Master needed little effort to imagine the wizard had been exactly as he was now; recumbent in that unofficial throne ceded to the most feared or respected Slytherin, the best seat in the house, as it were, near the warmest fire with the rest of the common room in sight, a position of power in the petty struggles of adolescence. Severus, of course, never sat there—nor did he care to.

"My lord," Severus drawled as he entered the room and came to stand in the periphery of Slytherin's vision. The other wizard waved him forward.

"Severus," he acknowledged. "Take a seat, won't you."

The Potions Master did as ordered, pulling his robes to one side with a practiced motion as he lowered himself onto one of the accompanying sofas. He studied the other wizard, jaw tight against recriminating thoughts, thinking that Slytherin was not so far removed in looks from the Dark Lord Severus had knelt to all those years ago. Slytherin was, after all, the _same_ man, a clone of some kind, a homunculus perhaps—undoubtedly a creature of Dark magic, but essentially still Tom Riddle and maybe _more_ Tom Riddle than Voldemort had been at the end. If such a thing were possible.

Time and hard-won wisdom had stripped the veneer and glamour from Severus' eyes; where he once saw pride, he saw only arrogance. Where he once saw power and prestige, he saw a well-dressed squatter, a malicious swindler, a liar, a thief. Neither Severus nor the Headmaster could roust the bastard from the castle, so he was an unequivocally powerful liar, but a liar all the same—a blight, a very slow poison taking root and rotting the magical world at its heart. The pernicious corruption of impressionable youths would be their destruction one day.

What a fucking moron he'd been to ever proffer his arm for Riddle's mark.

Slytherin said nothing for several minutes, content to take his time and finish his idle perusal of the painting and make the Potions Master wait. "Pleasant summer, Severus?"

"Yes, my lord. Busy, as well. The old man ensures I have little idle time on my hands."

"You know what they say about idle hands and the devil." Slytherin grinned and swirled his wine. Severus didn't tell him that expression was a Muggle euphemism. "He's just trying to keep you honest and on the path of righteous virtue, ' _my dear boy_.'" He laughed outright.

The corners of Severus' mouth quirked and he folded his hands together between his knees, the picture of relaxed and negligent, all thoughts of sneering and snapping and spitting at Slytherin kept well-hidden from the man and from himself. "Indeed. He did, however, happen to send me on a very…interesting errand the other day."

"Did he, now?"

"Yes, my lord." Severus drew his thumb over his knuckles, a calculated, thoughtful motion. "Forgive my impertinence, but I must ask if I've trodden on one of your many plans and haven't been informed."

Slytherin's expression sharpened. "Explain."

"The Headmaster sent me along to…clean up after a conflict between Gaunt's men and Harriet Potter's guardian." Not technically a lie, if one were to consider the chit's Horned Serpent in such a capacity. Of course, Severus wasn't about to tell Slytherin the girl was vulnerable, and it wasn't like Dogbane had the opportunity to report back on her whereabouts, thus eliminating the chance Slytherin had learned of her circumstances through a Ministry mole.

Slytherin set the wine glass down and leaned forward ever so slightly, and though he said nothing, his attention honed in on Severus like a snake spotting a juicy rat.

"It seems the Minister was curious to learn what had transpired with the girl in June."

The other wizard rose and stood over Severus, red eyes glinting. "And you believe _I_ was foolish enough to impart this information to _Gaunt_?" He sneered the name with particular venom.

"It is not my place to believe anything as such, my lord. It is your information to do with as you will; I simply wish to know if I should be suppressing knowledge of the event, or if I have been remiss in knowing your wishes regarding the matter." The Potions Master's smooth, unctuous tone never wavered even as the skin about his eyes tightened in increments.

Slytherin bore his teeth and the wine glass sailed into the hearth without him touching it, shattering, the painted snake entwined in the rowan hissing in irritation. "Of course I want the information suppressed, you fool!" The wizard began to pace between the armchair and the glass-strewn hearth, making no sound but for his snarling and the swish of rippling cloth. "I did not want the girl brought to _his_ attention anymore than it has been, let alone the _Minister_ ' _s_. I seek to secure the girl's potential for the Knights—sssomeone seeks to play us. Someone _dares_ share my secrets with _Gaunt!_ "

It was as Severus expected, then. He knew Slytherin would "seek to secure" any of his House for the Knights of Walpurgis—his chosen name for his Death Eaters—so his specific attention on Harriet wasn't shocking, especially not after the scene they discovered in Albus' office. He hadn't been certain, however, whether Slytherin had fed information to his Dark Lord counterpart for some heretofore unknown and undoubtedly dastardly plan, or if the man had a leak in his network of sympathizers and confidantes.

It seemed Slytherin had been betrayed.

"An unfortunate, but ultimately worthless event for a traitor to play his hand on, my lord," Severus murmured, watching Slytherin round on him with murder in his red eyes, the Potions Master modulating his every word. "Quirrell's own incompetence and weakened state led to his demise. I would not lay any claims of prodigal ability at _Potter's_ feet; she simply benefited from pure dumb luck."

The bastard was listening to him now, focused instead of idly hearing Severus, and so the younger wizard pressed his advantage, taking care not to lay undue suspicion. "A useful tool, to be sure, but not more so than her year mates. The traitor has extended his reach for fool's gold."

Slytherin smiled then, all sharp teeth and no guile, and though Severus didn't know if the wizard believed him about Potter's supposed worthlessness, he had successfully redirected his attention—for now. Slytherin had intimated far too much interest in Potter after June; whatever happened in that office, whatever new secret Albus was trying to bury, whatever had made the Headmaster pale and morosely reflective, Severus did _not_ want bloody Slytherin privy to.

Not for the first time, he wished the girl had gone to a different House. Severus didn't know how to keep her from Slytherin's clutches. He didn't know if he could.

The Dark wizard sat in his chair again, a veritable king in his throne—one who didn't need a crown to remind a man he could grind him into so much dust beneath his heel. "Leave me," Slytherin ordered, and Severus didn't hesitate, standing from the couch and bowing his head before he strode from the room.

He didn't breathe again until he reached his own quarters.

 **X**

The migraine pulsed white-hot behind his left eye, wreathing itself like Devil's Snare about his brain, and Severus could only press the side of the cool vial to his temple and mutter invectives under his breath until the potion kicked in. The bitterness of willow extract on his tongue matched his mood, and he swallowed it, shoving away all thoughts of Slytherin and traitors, unwilling to brood more upon the potentially dangerous situation.

If one suspects their boat has sprung a leak, they will search for the breach. Upon finding and fixing that leak, the very first thing a wise person would do is _check for another_.

In this droll metaphor, Severus was the second leak—much finer, much harder to find, but he didn't need some bloody idiot hemorrhaging information to bring Slytherin's discerning eye down upon him as well. The harsh truth of having a double-agent was _knowing_ that agent fed information, however selective, to your enemies, and then deciding at what point that agent crosses the line between obedience and dissension. Severus came perilously close to the line again and again over the years. Slytherin's last warning to him had been losing his eye. There would be no second warning.

He tucked the vial into his robe pocket and crossed the room to the Floo, throwing in a pinch of silver powder. It was very nearly seven in the evening. Severus spoke the address and the pass phrase Albus had lifted from the poor blighter in the Department of Magical Transportation, then stepped through the whirling fire to the kitchen of Grimmauld Place.

The smell of Earl Grey overcame the choking soot, and Severus looked around to find Minerva seated at the table with a cuppa, staring into the milky liquid with a distant eyes.

"Are you their minder for the day?" he sneered, flicking the last bit of ash from his robes. The older witch lifted her head and arched a brow.

"Good evening, Severus," she said, ignoring his jibe, gesturing to the chair across from her. A brush of magic jerked it away from the table. "Tea?"

He considered declining with his usual aspersive snark, but in the end simply grunted and dropped into the seat, accepting a conjured cup and pouring himself a serving from the kettle. The two professors drank in silence, the oppressive quiet of the house coming to rest on their shoulders until Severus could little stand the resulting stillness. "So…how did the old fool guilt you into watching brats during your holiday?"

Minerva snorted and sipped her tea. "They're well behaved girls, quiet and studious—hardly brats," she commented, smirking. "Neither came out very much like their fathers, did they?"

"You mean arrogant, destructive, or deranged? No, I can't say they did. But there's still time for those symptoms to present themselves."

She tutted and lifted her gaze, letting it rove past Severus to the china hutch bearing ancestral plates, to the ancient kitchen and its aged cupboards. Someone had spelled the room clean and returned vigor to the furnishings, but it remained dimly lit, old-fashioned, and touched by the Dark. "I can see why Sirius turned out as he did, being raised in this place. Sometimes, no matter how we try, it's impossible to escape our roots."

Severus didn't want to talk about Sirius fucking Black. He didn't want to think about his own roots—about Tobias Snape and the back-end of Cokeworth, because if a privileged prat like rich, pretty boy Sirius couldn't escape his fate, then Severus had no chance at all. He tightened his grip on the teacup.

"I told Albus it's not right to keep the children here, even said I would house them at Elphinstone's old cottage in Hogsmeade, but the protections are sound and Miss Black is intractable."

 _You mean pig-headed and irritating._ Severus wondered where Black had grown up, since it obviously hadn't been here. Potter once commented on Black's great-uncle, whom Severus knew for certain from Narcissa had enclosed himself in this wretched place after falling out with his remaining daughter, and so Black couldn't have been with Cygnus. Not for long, at any rate.

"An orphanage."

Blinking, Severus realized he'd spoken aloud—and Minerva had answered. "Pardon?"

"An Muggle orphanage in Wiltshire," she explained, lips pursed with her signature displeasure. "I checked the Book after Albus…." Pausing, Minerva seemed to struggle for the right word, a flush of anger in her cheeks, the Scottish brogue curling the edges of her voice. "After Albus told me about the _Dursleys_ and asked for my assistance. I'm sure you know, but the letters that go out to incoming and ongoing students in the summer are automated by the Book and the Quill through a regiment of Protean Charms mimicking the first letter I write and the year's requirements set by the Board, and though I oversee that every letter goes out, I haven't the time to check and verify all the addresses."

"Perhaps you should make the time," Severus retorted with a measure of censure and anger, Petunia's memories rising like bile from the pit of his mind.

Minerva shot him a look, and yet didn't defend herself. "Yes. Perhaps I should. Miss Potter's address, as you've already learned, was listed for The Cupboard Under the Stairs. Miss Black's was listed as St. Giles' Institute in Wiltshire."

"And this didn't necessitate a visit from a representative?"

"No. She's a pure-blood; both her parents are magical, and the Quill noted her down as such. The same with Miss Potter. Only Muggle-borns are indicated as needing a representative from the school to deliver their missive—and to inform them of Gaunt's bleeding MPA law."

"The letter system is flawed." He made no mention of the MPA, as stating the obvious irritated him.

"Yes," Minerva acceded. "And I will be watching it more carefully from now on, though you know as well as I do that abuse in Wizarding households isn't at all common, and I can't very well go and strip the Quill or the Book of their Charms because they've made mistakes, no matter how wrong. The Board would have my head." She sipped her tea, frowning. "She wrote to me over the summer—Miss Black, that is. She was very careful with what she said, and while some of her questions struck me as odd coming from a pure-blood, her rhetoric…I assumed her guardian was coaching her to be more precocious and curious. I never suspected she'd been raised in a Muggle environment. She's very clever, Severus."

"Did Miss Potter write to you as well?"

"No. Why?"

The Potions Master glowered at his cup and tried to make sense of this mess. _How in the hell did the girl reach Diagon Alley? Who told her? Who took her there?_ If Black was clever, then Potter was cunning, because for all that she seemed an affable, if odd, girl, Potter trusted little and played her secrets close to the chest. "Never mind."

"Och, you sound like Albus when you do that."

"That's not a compliment." Severus set aside his empty cup. "Next you'll be expecting me to proffer a bowl of lemon candies. Maybe keep a tin of peppermints on my desk for the children?"

Minerva chuckled and poured herself another serving, doctoring the cup to her liking. "I don't think the students would eat anything you handed them, Severus."

He sneered. "Good."

The cat just rolled her eyes and moved the conversation onto other topics. "Speaking of letters," she said. "I've handed Miss Black and Miss Potter their school lists this morning. They'll be in need of a trip to Diagon."

"I assume, knowing Albus, I'll have the dubious honor of ensuring they get there."

"Most likely, yes. You are the closest thing we have to a _real_ Head of Slytherin, and the girls are Slytherins, after all."

"Joy."

A prickling sensation began in his right wrist, creeping through the skin of his palm, and by the time Black came barging into the room, Severus had already regained his feet. "Professor—!" Black paused when she saw the Potions Master but she nonetheless continued, wringing her gloved hands. "Er—there's a chair in the parlor trying to eat Harriet."

Severus swept past the witch and climbed the stairs, hearing the thumps and muffled swearing echoing into the main corridor as he crossed below the leering elf heads and approached the front parlor. A chair had, indeed, made a go of devouring the bespectacled witch, seeming to have thrown her back into its cushions like a duck swallowing its meal whole, the seat raised to pin her in place. The girl's reading material had dropped on the floor when she'd attempted to sit, and her small fists balled and struck the furled arms while the chair growled.

Severus stared at the scene before him.

"Bloody, stupid, _fucking_ —!"

"Miss Potter!" Minerva had come up behind the Potions Master and now clutched at her chest. "Where on _earth_ did you hear such language?!"

By now the girl was more than a little red in the face, straining to yank her weight out of the ravenous seat, and Severus thought she may well started cursing at Minerva if no one assisted her. ' _Well behaved' indeed._

Severus slashed his wand and the chair fell to pieces. Potter hit the floor with a loud, indignant thump.

Pinching the bridge of his nose, the Potions Master turned and strode back into the hall. Summer could not end swiftly enough.

* * *

 **A/N: "The Knights of Walpurgis" was Rowling's original name for the Death Eaters, based off of "Walpurgis Night," a Christian holiday wherein bonfires are lit to ward away evil spirits and witches.**


	55. alley brawlers

**_lv. alley brawlers_**

Harriet took a bite of blueberry ice cream and sighed.

Summer seemed heavier in the Alley than in the rest of London, burning hot and implacable, laying sticky perspiration on the back of Harriet's neck, melting her frozen confection almost faster than she could eat it. Diagon was crowded with witches and wizards getting school supplies for their kids or taking advantage of the summer's end sales, milling from the North to South ends, spilling out of Gringotts with varying disgruntled faces. She saw Professor Selwyn walking with boxes under his arm and Professor Sinistra swanned by holding half of a telescope like it was her first-born child. She thought Longbottom made an appearance, but it was difficult to see in the crush of bodies.

Harriet could little believe that she'd only known she was a witch for a year. Livi shifted under her shirt and Harriet patted his side.

"We still need our books from Flourish and Blotts, and Harriet needs more clothes from Madam Malkin's or Twilfitt's," Elara said aloud as she studiously checked her list, legs crossed at the ankles below her chair, a soft pink flush on her fair skin from the sun. She looked much too warm in Harriet's opinion, but she wore the same long-sleeved dress and gloves she always did, the buttons on the collar done all the way to the top. "I need to visit Madam Malkin's as well."

"Alright," Tonks replied, a dab of pistachio ice cream on her chin, her hair electric blue and eye-catching. "Malkin's is up by Flourish and Blotts, so we should probably wander down to Twilfitt's on the South end, then come back up."

"Harriet needs to visit Weeoanwhisker's on Horizont for a haircut."

"Harriet is sitting right here," the girl in question groused. "And I don't _need_ a haircut."

"It'd be best to do it before term starts," Elara argued. "Or you'll have to have Madam Pomfrey do it and she's not fussed with making it look nice."

"As long as we're back to meet Snape at the Apothecary on time," Tonks said, leaning her chair on its back legs. "I don't much fancy making the bat wait."

Elara wrinkled her nose as she folded her list and placed it inside her robe pocket. Harriet wondered how she could stand all that black. "Is he honestly going to spend the whole day there?"

"He said something about doing the school account," Harriet put in, finishing off her ice cream. _Yeah, he said that in between all the mutterings about meddling old fools and babysitting_. They'd left that morning with Tonks and Professor Snape, the latter peeling off the second they'd arrived to go to Slug and Jiggers, saying he'd be there if needed and they should meet him at the store when ready to leave—which, incidentally, was no later than three. He also told Harriet and Elara that if they wandered off, he'd make sure they spent all of next summer locked inside Grimmauld Place.

Harriet grimaced at the thought.

"Alright, you lot!" Tonks said as she jumped to her feet and nearly trod on a bloke trying to reach his own table. "Finished with your lunch, yeah? Got all your packages still?"

Both girls obediently patted their pockets to ensure their shrunken parcels were still stashed inside.

"Good! On to Twilfitt's, then. And maybe we'll pop into Gambol and Japes right quick, love their Wet-Start fireworks…."

The trio of witches left the patio outside Florean Fortescue's and entered the fray, Tonks and Elara easily parting the way with their taller stature and Tonks' loping gait. Harriet, in contrast, found herself getting trod on more often than not and had difficulty keeping up. Somebody dropped a crate with a fire-breathing chicken inside and caused a mild panic.

"Excuse me, I need to—." She squeezed by a witch carrying a heavy cauldron and craned her neck in an attempt to see more than thighs and backsides. A flash of electric blue caught Harriet's eye and she headed after it, trapped behind a broad wizard and his darkly clad witch, neither inclined to jostle about and let Harriet through. The bespectacled girl let out an aggravated breath and contented herself with following the crowd in the direction Tonks had gone. Behind her, a bloke in maroon robes came stomping out of the crowd to yell at the man who'd been carrying the chicken crate.

" _Sss…._ " Livi stirred beneath Harriet's loose shirt and laid his angular head on her collarbone, creating an odd lump she hoped no one looked at too closely. " _Hungry._ "

" _You have to wait_ ," she hissed in reply, lifting her collar over her mouth. " _I told you it'd probably be better to stay at the house with Kevin. Kreacher would've fed you._ "

" _Muttering elf-creature isss annoying_ ," the serpent grumped. " _And Misstresss isss warm_."

 _"So you've said before_." Harriet sighed and gently poked his nose until he lowered it into a less obvious position. " _I'll try to get you a snack before we go back_."

The pair in front of Harriet finally turned away. Harriet lifted her head to get her bearings and—.

Stopped. She blinked once, twice, opened her mouth, and shut it again. She didn't know where she was.

Spinning in a tight circle, Harriet looked at the narrow, grubby brick walls and searched for a familiar landmark, something to orient herself, given that she'd spent a considerable amount of time in London's Wizarding district exploring its many recesses and _should_ recognize where she was. Few shops dotted the row she stood in, and those that did had grubby, hard to read signs, some boarded up with their windows covered by old Daily Prophets.

Witches and wizards still crowded the street—but they were different too, rougher, a perfidious smell choking the air that Harriet didn't rightly have a name for, something thick and cloying, mixed with the odor of unwashed body and spoiled potion. Swallowing, Harriet ducked her head and turned on her heels, heading back the way she'd come.

The row opened into a warren of shorter passages through dimly lit and shadowed breaks in the high walls, men and women crowded in the mouths of seedy shops, leering at Harriet when they caught sight of her. The bespectacled witch had done her fair share of traveling to new locales over the summer, but that was always with a sense of direction and destination, map in hand and a set course in mind. This was different; Diagon Alley had vanished and Harriet hadn't a clue where it'd gone, where she was, or how she'd gotten here.

She felt the weight of eyes burning into the back of her neck.

"Okay," Harriet whispered to herself, heart beating heavy and wet in her throat, her hands sweaty. "Okay, don't panic, numpty. I couldn't have come that far. I must have taken a wrong turn— _stay hidden_ ," she added to Livius, who had begun to stir beneath her clothes, sensing her agitation. The last thing she needed was him biting someone out in broad daylight.

Pausing in her harried wandering, Harriet looked down at her feet and muttered, "Set." She waited, hoping he'd heard her, but when a repeated utterance of the name did nothing, Harriet cursed under her breath and stomped a foot. "Oh, you _git_. Where are you when I _need_ you?"

She picked up the pace, and then Harriet bit her lip, stopping again, trying to recall what she could of the path here and wishing she hadn't been so distracted by Livi's peckishness and her own wool-gathering. _Snape's going to bloody murder me._

"Ooh, there's a pretty lass," crooned a witch leaning in the doorway of Dystyl Phaelanges. Dusty bones cluttered the display window.

"Scrawny little bint," her wizard companion said, puffing on his pipe. He glared at Harriet while the witch smiled, sending shivers down Harriet's spine.

"Lost, little lamb?" the witch asked. "Need a _hand_?"

"Err—no," Harriet managed to say before scuttling off, the witch and wizard guffawing in her wake. She came to the next corner and took it, telling herself the sooner she found the end of this place, the sooner she'd be able to find the beginning. Gut sinking, Harriet became more and more certain with every step that she'd somehow managed to take that blighted archway into Knockturn Alley, the one place in the district she'd always stayed away from, as it was emphatically _not_ for untended children. "Shite."

She backed out of a little leeway that dead-ended with a place called McHavelock's Wizarding Headgear, where a loitering wizard with a scraggly beard watched her too close for comfort, and continued instead up a set of short, broad stone steps. Harriet didn't remember taking any steps before so she knew she must be going in the wrong direction, but heading back the way she'd come seemed a terrible idea, and she remembered Knockturn opened somewhere along Toad Road just as it did Diagon. So long as she got _out_ of Knockturn, Harriet could find her way back to Tonks and Elara.

She tried not to run; the fastest way to make herself vulnerable was to run about scared and lost, so Harriet forced her spine stiff and blanked her face, pretending she knew her own business and wouldn't be fussed with someone trying to interfere. She was a Slytherin, for Merlin's sake, and one thing the older Slytherins loved to do late at night in the common room was brag about their adventures in Knockturn Alley. Harriet guessed most of their supposed exploits were a load of dragon dung, but most had one common thread; the Floo Network connected to Borgin and Burkes.

If she could find the shop, she'd have another place to escape—exit—from.

She turned onto another passage, darker than the last, and she thought the lane ahead looked brighter and more open than any of the rest she'd seen so far. Harriet rushed forward—and hurtled headlong into the cobblestones when the bite of a Tripping Jinx caught her unawares by the ankles. Harriet threw out her hands to catch her weight, scouring her palms on the rough stones, saving Livi from the brunt of the impact even as her knees and elbows throbbed. Her glasses skittered away, thrown by her momentum, and Harriet cursed her bloody eyesight as she rolled to her back and yanked her wand free of its brace.

It was the wizard she'd seen before, the one with the scraggly beard and low cap, moving purposely toward her with his wand extended. Harriet readied herself to hex the bollocks off the bastard, when she felt the soft brush of robes against her cheek, and the approaching wizard backed off as if spooked. He walked backward until he reached the alley mouth and disappeared.

Harriet glanced up to see her savior—and decided she might not be saved after all.

Standing stiff and poised, Professor Slytherin looked down his nose at Harriet crumpled on the ground, several emotions flickering over his face one by one, like a man switching masks, trying them on until he had the one that fit best. His red eyes narrowed. "Miss…Potter."

"P-Professor Slytherin," she managed, scrambling to her feet on her own. A small gash bled on her right hand, stinging where dirt had gotten into the wound, and her bones ached from colliding with the stones. She squinted, searching for her glasses, but the light was low and the walls too textured—.

Slytherin snapped his fingers, and Harriet's spectacles came darting up from a groove in the lane, landing squarely in his palm. He curled his lip at the dirt and shoved them into Harriet's hand, who quickly put them back into place, wincing at the long, spidery cracks marring one of the lenses. "Thank you, Professor."

He made a noise of acknowledgment, half-hum and half-scoff, then said, "Far be it from me to discourage…extracurricular interests, but you're not meant to be down here on your own. Where is your guardian?"

"We got separated," Harriet rushed to explain. "I'm—I didn't _mean_ to come down here."

"Hmm." He considered her for a long, uncomfortable moment, then Slytherin extended his hand, and though Harriet didn't much want to touch him, she reached out to take hold of it, Slytherin's fingers snapping into place around hers. His skin was ice cold and Harriet's neck hurt.

Without explanation, Professor Slytherin started off in a new direction and Harriet had to jog to keep up, lest the wizard drag her through the streets like an unhappy dog on a leash. Those people who'd sneered and watched Harriet from their shop stoops now quickly found other places to be or shrank into the shadows, eyes averted, all but jumping out of Slytherin's way. For his part, the professor simply looked bored, face slack and eyes half-closed, like his mind was a million leagues away from that dingy alley and the girl he yanked along by the arm.

Through the twisting byways they went until, from one step to the next, they came out from under a thick stone arch and once more entered the wider, _louder_ congregation floating along the middle of Diagon Alley. Harriet barely had time to take in a relieved breath before they were off again, Slytherin towing her through the throng faster than before, heading straight into a dense cluster comprised mostly of giggling, middle-aged witches.

" _Harriet!_ "

Professor Slytherin came to a sudden halt and Elara darted out of the crowd, colliding with Harriet, ripping her hand out of Slytherin's grasp. Harriet heard the older girl whisper, "Thank God," as Elara squeezed her tight and Harriet coughed. Livi grunted a complaint.

"Can't _breathe_ , Elara—."

A wizard bellowed aloud when Tonks came careening into their little group, having elbowed the unfortunate man in a sensitive area to get him out of her way. "Merlin's balls!" the auror almost wailed, clapping both hands onto Harriet's arms, narrowly missing Livi's coils. The serpent in question drew himself tighter around his witch's middle and hissed in warning, the sound going unheard in the louder hubbub. "Where did you go?! Are you _trying_ to get me murdered? Because I swear, Harriet, there are kinder ways to go about it—."

Tonks choked when she caught sight of Professor Slytherin favoring her with a contemptuous look. "Miss Tonks," he said, his smile hard. "How very…surprising. Does the Aurory often order you to babysit?"

Pale and obviously spooked, Tonks quietly acknowledged him with a muttered, "Professor," and gathered Harriet nearer, away from the wizard.

"Do try to keep better track of your charges, hmm? You never know where they might…wander."

Tonks nodded, not meeting his eyes, and Slytherin bled back into the crowd the way they'd come, presumably to return to Knockturn Alley—though he did glance at Harriet once more before disappearing. Tonks exhaled and straightened once he was out of sight—then thumped the shorter witch on the top of her head.

"Ouch!" Harriet shouted, hands jumping to the sore spot. "What was that for?!"

"For giving me a heart attack!" Tonk replied. She still looked rather pale, Harriet noted. "Holy Helga, don't tell Snape. _Please_ don't tell Snape; they won't find enough of my body parts for the coffin."

"That'd be a waste of perfectly good potion ingredients," Elara said in an eerily accurate imitation of the aforementioned Potions Master, and Harriet—relieved to be away from Knockturn Alley and her Defense professor—started giggling.

"You're not funny," Tonks said, scowling. A witch fighting her way to the front of the crowd jostled her, and Tonks looked around with a wince. "Hell—we don't have time for this lot. You still have that list of stuff you needed from Malkin's and Twilfitt's, cousin?"

Elara did, of course, still have the list, and she brought it out, handing it to Tonks. "Alright, then. I'm going to dash and get your clothes—don't worry, they have Sizing Charms, so everything should fit right—and you two are going to get your books. You're going to stay _right_ here at Flourish and Blotts until I come back, right? Not a toe out line! And stick together! Buddy system!"

"We're not babies," Harriet complained, though she didn't protest when Elara took one of her hands, giving it a squeeze. "We'll stay right here."

"No wandering off?"

"I didn't _wander off_ , I got lost in the stupid crowd."

Tonks snorted. "Yeah, well…. In case there's an emergency—." She lifted a hand and pointed out Slug and Jiggers only three doors down from Flourish and Blotts. Snape was supposedly there still. "But, like I said, only an _emergency_ —."

After getting several more assurances they wouldn't let each other out their sights and would stay in Flourish and Blotts, Tonks took off at high speed, meaning to get the rest of their stuff before they had to meet Snape at the apothecary and leave. Elara didn't release Harriet's hand and started to bodily shove witches and wizards out of the way, her glare sharp enough to head off any protests, and they came to a stop before the shop's entrance.

"' _Meet the author of Magical Me!'_ " Harriet read aloud from the glittering banner strung across the facia. "Who's the author of _Magical Me?_ "

"Him." Elara jerked her chin toward the front display window, in which a teetering stack of purple books had been set up, a blond, smiling wizard's portrait blowing kisses at the witches pressed up to the glass.

"Er…?"

Harriet didn't know what to say to that, and instead let Elara pull her inside the bookshop like putty through a very tight tube, the interior hot and muggy, the skinny manager who'd frowned when Harriet passed through too often in the beginning of the summer looking quite harassed at the moment. The tables in the front where they'd put out the different year bundles last summer had disappeared.

"Where's the book?"

"They've moved them for the stupid signing, obviously. We can find them ourselves, come on…."

Elara and Harriet headed down an aisle, finding themselves among a few other Hogwarts students instead of a gaggling horde of twitter-pated, middle-aged witches. "D'you think we're going to be like that when we're older?" Harriet asked, earning a scandalized look from her friend. "I'm serious. Do our brains go wonky or something at a certain age? Turn to pudding—? Hey, Hermione _!_ "

Harriet had been set to complain more about the buzzing witches when she caught a glimpse of bushy, brunette hair from the corner of her eye, flouncing around the corner from Autumnal Charms to Applications of Dactyliomancy. The hair in question came whipping back into sight when Hermione—balancing an absolute mountain of books—ran into their row.

"Elara! Harriet!"

A bit of awkward shuffling followed, the books having to be set down on the floor before the trio of witches could embrace, grinning from ear to ear. "Enjoying your summer, Hermione?" Elara asked.

"Well enough," she answered, pulling back to study her friends, tucking her frazzled hair behind her ears. "Oh, Harriet, what happened to your glasses? You're covered in dirt and—your hand! What have you done?"

She fussed over the bespectacled witch, muttering, " _Oculus Reparo_ ," as she tapped her wand against Harriet's glasses, while Elara pulled a handkerchief from her skirt pocket and wrapped it around her bleeding palm.

"Long story," Harriet said as her cheeks pinked. "I, um, well—I tripped." Which technically wasn't a lie.

Both Elara and Hermione gave her a look clearly indicating they didn't believe her, but instead of pushing the issue, Hermione shook her head. "Never mind. I haven't much time before the Malfoys come back for me. What have you been up to these past weeks? I might have, well, been eavesdropping a bit in the library, and I heard about you staying with Elara from Snape of all people…."

They shared an abbreviated and vague conversation on the events that had occurred over the last week or so, mindful of the potential ears listening in all around them. Hermione, for her part, summed up her vacation in just a few words. "I've been studying. That's it, really. Mr. Malfoy quizzes us almost daily."

"Are you…enjoying it?" Harriet asked, not sure if she should. Hermione loved testing her knowledge, but the look on her face didn't look nearly half so pleased as Harriet would have thought.

"Not especially, no. You know I rather like learning, and I _am_ learning so many things—did you know there's fifteen different schools of magic in Transfiguration alone? Professor McGonagall's mastery had an emphasis in _eight_ of the fields, including Animation, Transmutation, _and_ Golemnry, though obviously the professor's main emphasis was in Transformation."

"What the heck is Golemnry?"

"The production of golems—you know what a golem is, Harriet, you carry one in your shirt pocket half the time. Anyway; no, I can't say I much enjoy the testing. It's incredibly stressful."

Someone let out a put-upon sigh behind them, and the three witches turned to see Neville Longbottom standing in the middle of the aisle with his arms crossed. He stood with Ron Weasley and Dean Thomas as well, the latter pair busy chortling over a garishly colored book of joke jinxes. "Get out of the way, Slytherins," the Boy Who Lived grumbled.

"Bugger off, Longbottom."

" _Harriet_ ," Hermione reprimanded. "Really!"

"You're blocking the row," Longbottom snapped—which was true, once the witches considered Hermione's stack of books and their own bodies.

"Oh…." They shuffled over, moving the books with them, and Longbottom passed by. Ron and Dean barely spared them any attention at all.

Harriet hated the anger that swelled in her guts, that petty, envious feeling she got every time she had to look at Longbottom, especially after what Headmaster Dumbledore had said at the end of the year. He had parents, friends, fame—Harriet didn't much want _fame_ , but she despised how her own family had been reduced to some footnote in a textbook when Longbottom hadn't actually _done_ anything.

Gritting her teeth, Harriet shoved the feeling away and reminded herself she had much to be grateful for, and though her childhood hadn't been ideal, she had a home now—and a git of a pseudo-guardian who was going to be furious if they didn't get their textbooks together on time. At least he cared, in his own way. The Dursleys wouldn't have bothered with getting mad; they'd have just left her there.

"C'mon, we need our books…."

Hermione, having already gathered her own texts, helped Harriet and Elara find what they needed, and afterward Harriet wandered into the fiction section while Elara and Hermione argued over the reliability of a Transfiguration author. Harriet idly flipped through a few wizarding novels, her thoughts drifting toward Knockturn, wondering what Professor Slytherin had been doing down there. In the end, she decided she really didn't want to know and it would be wiser to keep her mouth shut.

 _Those people in the street were terrified of him…._

By the time they found their way back toward the front of the shop to make their purchases, the crowd had become impossibly thick, and Elara had one hand fisted in the hem of Harriet's shirt so they wouldn't be separated. They paid for their school books, then allowed themselves to be swept aside like flotsam since none of the three young witches could leave the store without their guardian.

"Hermione, do you have anything to eat?"

"I think I have a Cauldron Cake in my robe pocket, why?"

"Can I have a piece?"

Puzzled, Hermione found the Cauldron Cake and peeled back the wrapper, handing over the allotted bite of sweet bread—which Harriet promptly stuck under the collar of her shirt. At first the older witch blinked, confused, and then her eyes narrowed. "Are you _daft_? _"_ she hissed. "Really, Harriet. Why would you bring _him_ with you—?"

"Potter, did you just stick Cauldron Cake down your shirt?" The smarmy voice of Draco Malfoy startled the trio tucked in the corner, and he came slinking over, primly dressed in silver-tooled robes, haughty smirk firmly in place.

Harriet scowled. "No," she lied, wiping her fingers clean on her collar, feeling Livi swallow the bit of cake whole with a satisfied huff.

Malfoy didn't believe her, but he only shook his head. "Merlin, you're a weird witch."

The gathered spectators chose that moment to burst into applause, and Harriet strained to see a blond, resplendent wizard with gleaming white teeth come swanning out of the employee lounge. "Yes, hello! Lovely—how lovely it is to be here! Thank you!"

He waved at the gathered witches and winked, earning more than a few delighted gasps and bursts of excited giggling. "Who _is_ that?" Harriet asked, wrinkling her nose.

"Gilderoy Lockhart," Hermione said, breathless, and when Harriet glanced over, she found her friend's face had turned a startling shade of pink. "He's—quite brilliant, really. His books are _fascinating—_ here, I'll lend you one of mine…."

"Brilliantly stupid," Malfoy quipped, frowning at Hermione as she slipped a shrunken copy of _Gadding with Ghouls_ into Harriet's hands. "What's wrong with you Granger? You've gone all red."

"N-nothing!"

"You don't _fancy_ that pompous git, do you?"

Hermione reddened further, and Elara intervened. "Deflecting a crush of your own, Malfoy?" she drawled. "How unexpected."

"Shut up, Black."

"Is your father here, Draco? Is it time to leave?" Hermione asked, shooting Elara a grateful look. "I assume that's why you're bothering with us."

"Yes, he sent me to fetch you. He's just over— _father!_ "

Their small group managed to look around in time to witness Mr. Malfoy get slugged by a slightly balding, red-haired bloke in patched robes, and they toppled over into one of the shelves, books raining on them and the crowd. Witches shrieked, a shorter, red-haired woman screaming " _Arthur_!" louder than the rest while the harassed store manager burst into tears. Two boys somewhere in the thick of things started yelling, "Get him, Dad!" and a photographer from the Daily Prophet clicked away on his camera like mad.

Torn between running to his father's rescue and not getting punched for the effort, Draco stood frozen, mouth agape.

"Break it up, you two! Break it up!" boomed a familiar voice. Harriet smiled when she saw Hagrid squeeze his way through the entrance, nudging aside witches with little effort on his part to reach Mr. Malfoy and the red-haired wizard, yanking the pair apart by the scruffs of their necks. "That's 'nuff of that!"

Mr. Malfoy staggered on his own two feet and yanked his tailored robes back into place, his eye already purpling, pale hair splayed about his shoulders. It irked Harriet that, like his son, he still managed to look pretty even when mussed and angry—the git. " _Unhand_ me, I'm on the Board of Governors and could have you dismissed in an instant—." Mr. Malfoy sucked in a ragged breath. "Draco! Hermione! We are leaving; I won't patronize an establishment that serves such…commoners."

Draco shuffled forward, one hand latched on Hermione's sleeve, and Hermione cast a final, despairing look at Harriet and Elara before she let herself be steered from the store. The witch who'd screamed was busy mopping the red-haired wizard's—Arthur?—bloodied lip, all while furiously berating him for brawling in public. Harriet spotted Fred and George Weasley standing nearby, and guessed the couple had to be their mum and dad.

As the book signing continued, and Lockhart went into raptures when he spotted Longbottom among the onlookers, Harriet caught Elara's eye and the other witch suddenly grinned, white teeth bright with plain humor. "Do you think it would be inappropriate for me to send Mr. Weasley a thank you gift?" she asked. "Because that was amazing."

Harriet laughed.

* * *

 **A/N: Random note I'll probably extrapolate more on later in the story, but I'm _not_ going to magically fix Harriet's eye-sight. It bothers me when fics change that aspect of Harry right off, like it's some kind of horrid flaw. Magic has its limits, and I want to preserve that part that seems to quintessentially Harriet.**

 **Poor Tonks. She was 99% prepared for Snape to murder her, no doubt.**


	56. summer's end

**_lvi. summer's end_**

 _Bang. Bang. Bang._

The noise resounded in the house's confines each time Elara's trunk came down hard on a step. Harriet, twiddling her thumbs in the kitchen, listened to the sound and was torn between amusement and being horribly anxious as she watched Snape—seated on the other side of the table—grow progressively more irritated.

 _Bang. Bang. Bang._

"Will you _pick that up_?!" the Potions Master suddenly bellowed, startling Harriet and, from the sound of squawking out in the hall, several of the Black portraits. Elara must have heard the man, but she did not, in fact, pick the trunk up, and continued her downward trek through the main corridor, the basement steps, and then into the kitchen itself. She dropped the trunk in question by Harriet's next to the Floo, and though she didn't quite meet Snape's eyes, Elara smirked as she took her seat.

 _She's going to land us both in detention as soon as school starts_ , Harriet thought, though she couldn't quite hide her own smile. ' _Ten points for blinking, Miss Black. Is that air you're breathing, Miss Potter? Ten points.'_

"If you two are quite done," Snape sneered, his arms crossed and expression stern. Harriet bit her tongue before she could protest that she had come down as soon as he told her to and hadn't been the one slamming her trunk on every step. "Term starts tomorrow. I expect you to have all of your things together and be ready to depart at precisely ten tomorrow morning."

"I don't understand why we can't Floo directly to Hogsmeade later in the evening," Elara said. "It doesn't make sense to me."

"Do you assume you're the first person to ever consider the thought?" Snape snapped. "You and every other pure-blood's get wishes to Floo directly into the village—which any Dark wizard seeking to extort money from an old family would know, wouldn't they? Do try to use your brain. Special dispensation is granted only to those living within a set distance of the village, otherwise all students are expected to ride the train for security purposes, whether they _want_ to or not."

Elara crossed her arms and said nothing else.

"Your petulant attitude is tiring, Black."

The witch might have risen to the bait had Harriet not chosen that moment to cough, loudly, into her hand. Snape glowered at both of them.

"As I was saying…you will leave precisely at ten. Floo access opening onto the station is restricted as it is in Hogsmeade—again, for security purposes, not that I should have to explain myself to you. Access between Grimmauld and Kings Cross will be open for precisely five minutes. Should you miss that window, you are not to leave the house—and should your excuse for doing so be anything other than the spontaneous loss of a limb or an act of God, I will have you scrubbing cauldrons for the _year._ You will send your wretched bird to Hogwarts if you miss the train."

Said wretched bird scowled at the Potions Master, if birds could scowl. Cygnus and ancient Percival both perched on the metal bar above the Charmed ice chest, seeming to listen in on the conversation. "Yes, professor."

Elara muttered under her breath again, which Snape took exception to, and while they snarled at one another for their perceived insults, Harriet slipped out of her chair and meandered back upstairs. She had her pajamas and a change of clothes for the morning laid out on the foot of her bed, but otherwise her room at Grimmauld Place was empty once more, and it made Harriet a tad nervous. Would she be able to come back next summer? What about Yule?

Sitting on the mattress' edge, Harriet toed off her tennis shoes and Livi slithered out from his nest beneath the bed to investigate.

" _We're going to Hogwarts tomorrow,_ " she informed the serpent, watching as he inspected her shoes, then turned his attention to her, violet tongue flickering.

" _The ssstone placcce_?"

" _Yes_." Harriet scratched her chin and sighed. " _Remember we talked about you having to stay in the dorm from now on_?"

The frustrated noise coming out of Livi proved that yes, he did in fact remember that particular conversation and had not warmed to the topic since they'd first discussed it. Harriet and Elara had dug out a few old books on owl training that had Charms to prevent biting, and they planned on showing Hermione to see if the brilliant witch could figure out how to adapt the Charms to a snake—not that Harriet was thrilled about virtually muzzling her familiar. It _would_ let her take him out of the dorm, however.

Professor Dumbledore worried about the students and Harriet knew Livi wasn't a pet, not really. He was a wild animal, magical enough to have 'equivalent human sapience' as Hermione would say, and the thought of cursing him—even with something meant to protect them both—sat heavy and uncomfortable in her middle. Livi lifted his head and Harriet reached out to rub the scales on his nose, small fingers skirting around the glittering gem set in his skull.

She wanted Livi with her. Harriet couldn't forget what had almost happened mere months ago, when Professor Quirrell—out hunting for any likely candidate who could get him the Stone—had nabbed her from the dungeons and dragged her to Dumbledore's office. She almost died. Livi could have protected her had she not left him behind. What she'd witnessed in the woods had been nightmare worthy, but she vastly preferred how things had turned out to being kidnapped or killed or—worse.

Staring at her shadow, wondering where Set had gone off to, Harriet mulled over the events of her summer and considered the approaching school year. Back to Hogwarts. She didn't know if she was excited or nervous.

The thumping returned, much lighter than before, and Elara came stomping into the room, throwing herself onto the bed next to Harriet with her arms crossed and her face set in a scowl. "I hate him," she declared.

Thinking of Uncle Vernon and the Dursleys, Harriet shrugged. "He's not so bad."

Elara turned her head to glare at Harriet, who smirked, and the older girl relented, returning her gaze to the ceiling. "No, I guess not. He is insufferable, though."

"I bet you even people who like Snape probably hate him a bit. It's a requirement."

They giggled, then settled, Harriet helping Livi onto the bed so he could curl into a heap against her side. Touching his scales again, she hummed in thought. "What d'you think this year's going to be like?"

"Normal, hopefully."

"D'you…." Harriet hesitated. "Do you think that—that I'll be in danger there? With all this stuff happening this summer? Is the Dark Lord behind it?"

"I don't know, Harriet, truly. I _do_ know we'll need to be cautious and keep our eyes open. Nobody suspected Professor Quirrell, remember?"

"Yeah." Unnerved, the bespectacled witch pulled Livi closer and cuddled his coils as one might cuddle a puppy. "I don't like it. Wasn't the whole point of them making a spectacle of Longbottom to make sure I wouldn't get this kind of attention?"

"In theory. But like Snape said, you're a trouble magnet."

"Am not!" Harriet nudged Elara's side. "Wait, when did he say that?"

"After you left the kitchen. He gave me a lecture on keeping our noses clean and our heads down."

"That's odd."

"What? Him not wanting you to get into any mischief? He does that a lot if you've noticed."

"Well, now that you mention it—but, no. _Trouble magnet_. That's a Muggle euphemism, isn't it? It's odd that Snape would use it."

Elara's lips pressed into a line, her hand pushing Livi's tail away without thought so she could sit up. "Not really. He's at least a half-blood, so he might have a Muggle for a parent, or be Muggle-born for all we know."

" _No_ ," Harriet gasped, shocked by the idea. She suddenly had an image of Snape lounging in Aunt Petunia's house watching telly and found it absurd. "How do you know that?"

"There's no 'House of Snape,' either active or defunct. He could be foreign, of course, but I know he attended Hogwarts, since he was Head of Slytherin for two years, and only Hogwarts alumni are allowed to be Heads of Houses. The Blacks keep reams of logs tracking the different Houses through the years, going back past the Norman Invasion, and in 1544, when then the old Circles formed the Wizengamot, there were three hundred and thirty-three recognized Houses. Uncle Cygnus had me review or at least skim most of it, and I never saw a House of Snape. Logic dictates he's most likely a half-blood."

"You and Hermione read way too much," Harriet grumped, falling back into the bed, her legs hanging off the edge. It did make sense; she'd heard Snape say Muggle things before, little snippets she guessed he could have picked up over the years from his students. It was an interesting tidbit of information she tucked away to consider later.

"You read just as much as we do—just not the same content."

"I like Muggle fantasy novels. Wizard fantasy novels are weird—they follow these jumps in logic I just don't get and how they describe Muggle stuff is absurd."

They chatted for a while on inconsequential things, until Elara yawned and Harriet's eyes grew heavy, though she felt anxious and uneasy about their upcoming trip back to Hogwarts. The older witch returned to her room, leaving Harriet to settle Livi in the mess of blankets under the bed and change into pajamas. Once finished, she tapped the rune on the base of her dusty lamp, plunging the bedroom into darkness. Moonlight puddled around the curtain bottoms, and in the colorless glow she saw Set flick and curl.

Harriet glowered at the shadows as she flopped into her blankets, dropping her glasses onto the night table. "Fat lot of help you were yesterday," she snapped. "I almost got kidnapped and—I don't know—harvested for fingernails!"

Set continued to flicker and curl, remorseless, amorphous, and Harriet sighed. "Fine."

Pulling the sheet up to her chin, Harriet let her blurry gaze rest on the ceiling, splashes of light from the Muggle street and threadbare moonlight coloring the dusty boards. Set made shadow puppets in the blotches, and though Harriet wanted to stay irked, she smiled at memories of funny cartoons dancing on the cupboard's roof, her childish giggles earning Aunt Petunia's suspicion—and her fear.

Harriet fell asleep and dreamed she was at Hogwarts. She dreamed of making a potion in Snape's eerie classroom, her desk the only one there, the stirring rod clasped tight in her small hand as Harriet counted the turns. Someone banged on the door and snarled, " _Let me in_ ," but Harriet concentrated on her work, leaving the door alone.

She wouldn't remember the dream when she woke.

* * *

 **A/N: Finallllllly going back Hogwarts! The beginning of this year was _not_ supposed to be that long, but it had a lot of very important exposition that sets up quite a few events for this year and the next few. _Especially that little Wizengamot tidbit *cough, cough*_**


	57. welcome back

**_lvii. welcome back_**

At precisely ten o'clock the next morning, Harriet and Elara stepped through the Floo at Grimmauld Place to Platform Nine and Three-Quarters and were both quite pleased when nothing went amiss. Harriet had expected something to go terribly wrong somewhere and thus bring the Wrath of Snape down on their heads.

"All right, Elara?" she asked as the dark-haired witch swayed in place, looking green.

"'Ine," she grunted—and Harriet wrinkled her nose when she spat out half a peeled ginger root. Elara tossed it in the bin to be Vanished and rolled her eyes. "It's for nausea, Harriet."

"Oh, right."

Given the train had another hour before departure, few students had arrived and most that had still mingled on the platform with their parents, going through their trunks to check if they'd missed anything or trying to calm fussy, caged familiars. Elara and Harriet went in search of a compartment and found one they liked in the back of the train, settling in to wait for Hermione.

It didn't take long for the final member of their trio to arrive; both girls saw Hermione walk onto the platform with the Malfoy family and Jamie Ingham, looking eager to be going back to school and also eager to escape her handlers. The bushy-haired witch nodded quickly to something said to her by Mrs. Malfoy, and then dashed off when the older witch turned her head.

Elara stood. "I'll go find her."

A few minutes later, Elara returned with Hermione in tow, the latter ranting in a low, furious undertone about how much she despised Draco Malfoy.

"—little toad uprooted half the Affable Azaleas in the greenhouse and has the _gall_ to blame it on me! _Me_! Of course, Mrs. Malfoy didn't believe him for an instant, but he still earned us all an hour-long lecture on respecting the gardens—and in the _middle_ of Malfoy Senior's tirade, he leans back and crushes the Highlander Ivy! I got told off for not stopping him—! Oh, hello, Harriet."

"Hi, Hermione."

"How are you then?"

 _Anxious. Nervous. A bit scared._ "Err—good, I guess. Sounds like you've had better days, though."

Hermione let out an aggrieved huff as she sank into an empty seat. "It'll be a relief to get back to school. I've missed you both terribly. How was living at Elara's house?"

"Er, pretty great."

Elara scoffed as she sank onto the bench across from them. "Most everything is still cursed, broken, or otherwise out of order. Should it be visible to Muggles, I would fully expect to arrive home at Yule to find a condemned sign on the door."

"Surely it isn't _that_ bad."

They chatted about the grim—and often fascinating—secrets to be found inside of Grimmauld Place while the train and the platform slowly filled, the volume of voices increasing as departure time neared. Harriet kicked her feet while Elara and Hermione argued, thinking about their trip to Hogsmeade last year. A lot, and very little, had changed since then.

The conversation eventually turned to the letter Harriet had received from Nicholas Flamel, and she pulled down her trunk long enough to fish out the French book for Hermione to flip through. The other witch went into instant raptures, rattling off fluid French paragraphs that fairly boggled Harriet's mind and earned a reproving tut from Elara. By then, the train had begun to move, and Hermione whipped out a Self-Inking Quill from her own satchel and a fresh roll of parchment to start translating the author foreword.

"It's about recognizing Dark magic, defining it and understanding its origins. Oh, books like these aren't really popular in England anymore—not after Grindelwald and, well, You-Know-Who. _Fascinating_. Do you mind if I keep this while I work on the translation? But you really should learn a few of these phrases—they come up in other branches of magic, and it'll be beneficial in the long run. I'll just be sure to make a note here…."

"Of course. Thanks for all your help, Hermione."

They subsided into a comfortable quiet wherein Harriet watched London disappear outside their window, Elara brought out one of her family's journals to read, and Hermione scribbled away on the parchment. The silence lasted for a handful of minutes before the compartment door clattered open and two girls stuck their heads in.

"Hey, do you mind if we sit here?" asked the first, her face heavily freckled and her ginger hair hastily tied back. "Everyone else is full."

"Of course," Hermione replied. She rose and quickly gathered her scattered things, making room on the bench next to her while Harriet stood to help the newcomers heave their trunks into the overhead rack. She proved a bit too short to manage on her own, and Elara had to stand and assist, trying her hardest not to smirk.

"Thanks," the red-head said as she sat, heaving a relieved sigh. She wore what looked like Muggle clothes, but Harriet—who'd had a bit of a fascination for wizard fashion ever since she first walked into the Leaky Cauldron and saw how very odd the styles were—could tell the threading about the seams had been done by hand or by wand, not by machine, and an animated Quidditch player flew on the shirt's front. Faded as he was, he still tipped them a wink and flew around a flaking, orange "CC" logo.

The second girl sat as well, blonde hair falling in haphazard waves past her thin shoulders. "Hello," she said, her wide, silvery eyes passing over the trio of dark-haired witches. She dressed in tights and a plum-colored dress, a spot of mulch on one knee, almost as if she'd knelt quickly in the garden for something before leaving home. She balanced a little wooden box in her lap as well as a folded newspaper. "I'm Luna."

"And I'm Ginny," the other girl added.

"Hermione Granger," Hermione said, extending a hand for the pair to shake. "How do you do? This is Harriet and Elara."

Feeling a touch sheepish in the presence of strangers, Harriet smiled, and Elara only gave a nod.

"I don't think I've seen you before. Are you both first years?"

Luna and Ginny nodded.

"We're second years. Are you excited about starting school? Do you know what Houses you think you'll be in?"

"Gryffindor," Ginny said without hesitation, shrugging her shoulder with affected ease. Harriet could tell by the way she nibbled her lip that Ginny wasn't as certain as she seemed. "My whole family's been Gryffindors for as long as anyone can remember, apparently."

Before Luna could answer, the compartment door slid open again, and Harriet groaned when Draco Malfoy sauntered in. He didn't get far, and there was little space as is, so Crabbe and Goyle loomed in the empty corridor, the latter sporting a smudge of chocolate on his cheek. "Granger, you ran off to find the House losers, I see."

"My _friends_." Hermione stuck her nose in the air. "If that's what you mean, then yes."

Malfoy scoffed and dropped onto the bench, forcing Elara over, which squished Harriet into the window. "Whatever, Granger." He seemed to realize the two younger girls were there and scrutinized Ginny in specific, nose wrinkling. "Red hair and hand-me-down clothes? You _must_ be a Weasley. I didn't know that their brood had any girls in it."

"Don't be an arsehole, Malfoy."

" _Harriet_ , really—."

"I thought you didn't like Weasleys, Potter?" Malfoy asked, interrupting Hermione. "Especially after what you did to Ron, the Gormless Gryffindor."

Harriet went to object, when Ginny blinked and let out a soft sound of recognition. "Potter. Harriet Potter? Aren't you the one who beat up Ron last year?"

Harriet blushed scarlet and sputtered. "I—! I didn't beat him up!" Malfoy started to laugh, and even Hermione looked very near cracking a smile. "Hey! I _didn't_! I just—punched him in the mouth a bit."

Expecting anger, Harriet was surprised Ginny smirked, tucking a bit of loose hair behind her ear. "He probably deserved it. Ron can be thick at times."

"Like the rest of you Weasleys," Malfoy sneered. He crossed his arms and ignored their pointed glances with a haughty scoff.

"Draco," Hermione said, her patience far outlasting Harriet's own, though she stressed the syllables of the boy's name like she wanted to hurl them physically at his head. "What are you doing here?"

"I was looking for Longbottom. I haven't seen him." When he mentioned Neville, Ginny's face lit up like a ripe tomato, and Malfoy snickered cruelly. "That's right, the Prat Who Lived was staying with your family for part of the summer at your hovel, wasn't he?"

"How do you even know that?"

"Read the paper, Potter—or can't you read with those ugly things you call glasses?"

Elara snapped her journal closed, the sound moving everyone's attention to her as she, in turn, directed a cold look at Malfoy. "You've been sufficiently irritating and can leave now. Perhaps I should write to your mother and mention your deplorable lack of manners in the presence of ladies."

The mention of Mrs. Malfoy had Draco rising and shuffling off, though not before his half-hearted utterance of "not seeing any ladies present" was heard. He stormed through the door, slamming it shut behind him and his goons, though the latch didn't catch, and it rattled open again.

"Merlin, he's annoying," Harriet muttered. "Was he like that all summer, Hermione?"

"Yes. I'm sorry about him. But never mind—what were you saying before, Luna?"

"Nothing in particular. Dad and Mum were both Ravenclaws, so I think I'd like to go there—but you never know where you'll end up until you get there, do you?" Her voice lilted in question as if she meant for someone to actually answer, and when no one did, Luna shrugged. Harriet wasn't sure, but she thought the other girl might have a sprig of mugwort tucked behind her ear. "Oh, well."

They chatted for a while—or Hermione mostly told the two what to expect from their first year and listed all the qualifications of the professors while Harriet tried to reel in her enthusiasm and Ginny just blinked, dazed by Hermione's zeal. Elara returned to her journal, and Luna, humming under her breath, brought out the paper— _The Quibbler_ —she had and disappeared behind its pages. Harriet scratched her neck while Livi dozed beneath her loose shirt.

"What do you think that Malfoy bloke meant by not being able to find N-Neville?" Ginny asked at one point, her cheeks faintly pink. "He went through the barrier with my brother, right after me and my dad, and Luna and her dad."

"Maybe he's just avoiding Malfoy," Harriet said, shrugging. The trolley witch came around, and Harriet was quick to empty her purse, buying lunch for the compartment, and though Hermione frowned over the mound of sugary confections, she didn't reject the proffered package of Toothflossing Stringmints. "Like Hermione did last year. She came diving through the door and hid under the window until he passed by."

"I was tempted to the same this year, but I figured he would stop to harass you and Elara anyway."

"He seems very confused," Luna commented as she unwrapped a Cauldron Cake, licking her sticky fingertips. "His head must be full of Wrackspurts."

"Full of—what now?" Hermione gave the blonde witch a puzzled look. "'Wrackspurts?'"

"Wrackspurts. Tiny creatures that fly into your ears and make your brain go fuzzy."

Ginny winced and rubbed the side of her nose, though Luna didn't seem to notice. "Luna and her dad believe in some, um, _different_ stuff than a lot of witches and wizards."

"So, they're imaginary."

"No, they're not."

"But I've never read anything on _wrackspurts_ before."

"Just because you haven't read about them doesn't make them less real," Luna insisted.

"Malfoy's full of something, but I don't think it's Wrackspurts."

" _Harriet_ , honestly."

"I didn't say anything."

Noise in the corridor paused their conversation as two older boys passed by the compartment's open door. "I swear I saw it!"

"Did you smuggle Butterbeer onto the train again, Cormac? McGonagall will find out and write your da if you can't keep it together."

"I'm not mucking about, I really did see it! There was a flying car, clear as day!"

"You're delusional, mate."

The pair drifted out of earshot, and Elara rose to slide the door shut. Harriet looked out the window—seeing nothing aside from the rolling green of the countryside and a fat plume of steam coming out the front engine—and then looked to the others. "Did he just say a flying car?"

 **x X x**

Soon enough, the train rolled to a stop at Hogsmeade station, and a flock of black-robed students disembarked, their laughter and shouts echoing off the trees into the evening air and the neighboring village. Harriet pointed out Hagrid and Professor Selwyn to Ginny and Luna, who went to the half-giant and sour-faced History of Magic professor with the rest of the incoming first years so they could be shepherded across the lake. In contrast, Harriet and the rest continued along the platform to the line of waiting carriages and Professor Flitwick, who made sure everyone made it off the station and didn't wander into Hogsmeade.

Harriet glanced at the ghoulish Thestral drawing their carriage. She didn't mention it to Elara or Hermione.

The wheels clattered on the road as they out, passing through the gates flanked by large, winged boars on stone pillars, and through the trees Hogwarts came into view, just as brilliant and beautiful as Harriet remembered it, and her heart thrummed with anticipation. She loved living with Elara—but the castle felt like _home_ , a home she'd never known before. After such an eventful summer spent traveling all over the magical settlements in Great Britain, it seemed to Harriet as if a knot in her middle loosened once she caught sight of the towers silhouetted against the spangled sky.

As second years, they followed the rest of the student body straight into the Great Hall and found seats at the four tables, the noise volume increasing as spots filled and professors filed in from the faculty door. Harriet spotted her Head of House as soon as he sauntered in and quickly looked away when his head snapped in her direction.

The Sorting took place, and Harriet clapped when Luna was placed in Ravenclaw and Ginny in Gryffindor, the latter hailed by raucous cheers from the Weasley twins and their prefect brother Percy. Harriet scanned their table, but she didn't spot Ron anywhere—or Longbottom. _Where'd they go?_

The clapping dwindled as Headmaster Dumbledore rose from his seat at the Head Table and lifted his arm for quiet. "Ah, how wonderful it is to see you all again—or to see you for the first time! Welcome to another year at Hogwarts!"

More applause came from the assembled students seated at their respective House tables, and Harriet watched as Professor Dumbledore smiled and waited for quiet again.

"Before we dig in to our delectable meals, lend me your ears for a moment longer so I may list a few start-of-term announcements. Firstly, I am delighted to introduce our newest member of staff, Professor Burbage, who will be teaching Muggle Studies." An older brunette witch with a tentative smile rose when acknowledged and bobbed her head. Clapping again ensued, as did a fair measure of muttering when students speculated on just what had happened to Professor Quirrell.

"At least this one doesn't look keen on murdering me," Harriet whispered to Elara at her side.

"Yes, but neither did Quirrell."

"True."

"—the first Hogsmeade trip for third years and above is scheduled to be in December," Professor Dumbledore continued. "And Quidditch trials will be held next week for the respective House teams. Please contact Madam Hooch with any questions—."

Across the table from Harriet and her friends, Draco straightened in his spot between Crabbe and Goyle, a smug expression Harriet didn't like one bit tugging at his mouth. "Slytherin will be taking the Cup this year," he asserted. "Father's made a rather generous contribution; he bought the entire team Nimbus Two-Thousand-and-Ones—much better than the Nimbus Two-Thousand, that shoddy twig Longbottom rides. I'll be the new Seeker, of course."

On the other side of Crabbe, the muscle-bound sixth year Marcus Flint grunted. "Not until I see you sit a broom, Malfoy. If you can't fly, doesn't matter what model you got."

"I can fly!"

A few upperclassmen shushed him when Malfoy's indignant outburst drew the heavy gaze of Professor Slytherin. Headmaster Dumbledore cleared his throat.

"Ah, well—I'll save the remainder of the announcements after the feast. For now, tuck in!"

The gleaming golden dishes and chargers filled with food at the wizard's words and the students wasted no time piling their plates high with scrumptious delicacies. Harriet didn't notice at first; she was too busy looking at Malfoy, a sinking feeling in her middle spoiling her appetite. She had wanted to try out as Seeker this year. It was no secret in Slytherin House that Terence Higgs, their current Seeker, was simply the best of a terrible situation, and Harriet had hoped that—though she'd never played Quidditch before—she would at least be able to try out. Apparently, there was no point.

Elara followed her attention across the table to the blond prat now listing broom specifications to Goyle, who honestly looked as if he'd heard all this a hundred times before. "Everything all right, Harriet?"

"Yeah," the bespectacled witch muttered, snapping out of her own sullen thoughts to reach for the mashed potatoes. "I'm fine."

They were halfway through the meal when Hermione pointed out that Snape wasn't present, and indeed, his chair remained conspicuously empty between Professors Selwyn and Slytherin. Filch came slinking through the faculty door, dressed in his usual frayed housecoat with Mrs. Norris at his heels, and went straight to the Headmaster, muttering something in his ear. Professor Dumbledore nodded, wiping his mouth with his napkin, and leaned over to maybe repeat what Filch had said to Professor McGonagall—whose lips pursed in a thin, disapproving line before they both stood and followed Filch from the hall.

Harriet wondered what that was about.

The professor returned before dessert finished, and Headmaster Dumbledore issued his cursory warning against magic in the corridors and noted any products from Gambols and Japes or Zonko's would be confiscated by Filch if found in their possession. He left off the warning against certain death if they wandered on the third-floor corridor, which was nice, and then dismissed them off to bed. Harriet gladly stumbled to her feet and trailed Prefect Farley down to the dungeons.

In the cold, subterranean shadows beneath the lake, the silver lanterns glowed like soft stars in the dark of space, shapes flickering in the murky tide beyond the common room windows, the air in their lungs smelling of earth and salt, wood smoke and green things. Harriet gave half-hearted greetings to her other dormmates—Parkinson, Bulstrode, Greengrass, Davis, and Runcorn all accounted for—and fell into her bed, Livi hissing in her ear as he tightened his slipping coils.

She listened to the water sigh, the other girls whispering among one another, and fell asleep in minutes.

It was nice to be home.

* * *

 **A/N: *Harriet arriving like a nice, normal student* "Golly, I hope this year's nice and average." *distant cackling ensues***

 **I also brought Luna into the story earlier (like I did with Tonks). In canon, the Lovegoods live near Ottery St Catchpole, and given how small the wizarding community is, I doubt the Lovegoods wouldn't be friendly with their neighbors, the Weasleys. I find it likely two witches of the same age living in the same area would be friends, and that the Weasleys would be quick to offer their support for Xenophilius and Luna after her mother died only a year or so before she was set to go to Hogwarts. Anyway, that's just my theory.**


	58. strike a king

**_lviii. strike a king_**

In Hogwarts, rumors circulated with the kind of practiced efficiency the professors direly wished the students would portray in their classwork, and so by the time Harriet sat down to eat breakfast the next morning, she had already learned the newest bit of scandal involving Neville Longbottom.

"A flying car? _Really?_ " Harriet asked Hermione as she picked over her eggs.

"According to Pansy, who heard it from Parvarti," she said with a delicate sniff that portrayed her regard for idle gossip. "But that's all hearsay. I would imagine that if they had _truly_ crashed a flying Ford Anglia into the Whomping Willow, they wouldn't _be_ here this morning."

They both glanced toward the Gryffindor table, where they found Longbottom and Weasley seated with Finnigan and Thomas. None of the four second years looked up from their plates, even when their classmates jostled and pestered them for information.

"He _is_ the Boy Who Lived," Harriet said, old anger prickling along her nerves. "I doubt he could get expelled for anything, short of murder. The Prophet would never let the Headmaster live it down."

Snape came down along the table and passed out schedules for the Slytherins. Harriet took hers and could barely hold back a groan. "Look at this!" she complained once the Potions Master moved off. "Defense _and_ Potions right in the morning! And Astronomy tonight!"

A furrow appeared between Hermione's brows. "And Charms and History of Magic after lunch." Her eyes flickered toward the Head Table, where Professor Selwyn was doctoring his English breakfast tea to his liking. Harriet winced in sympathy.

Elara—eyes scrunched, mouth set in a hard grimace—arrived, and Harriet slid down the bench to give her room. Snape returned, her schedule in hand, and he glowered at the half-asleep witch in warning before he let her take it from him. Elara glanced at the listed classes, grunted, and lowered her head to the table, bumping a platter of sausages. None of the other second years looked pleased either; the Slytherin professors were notably more difficult to handle, even to their own House, and having all four on their first day was dreadful.

Sighing, Harriet managed a few more bites of breakfast, then pulled her school bag onto her shoulder. "I'm going to go now. I don't want to be late." _Not after what happened this summer with Slytherin._

"All right. We'll catch up with you in just a few minutes."

Harriet departed the Great Hall and climbed the marble steps, finding her way to the corridor where the Defense classroom and Slytherin's office were kept. The professor never opened the door early—never opened it until he was good and ready to do so—so she sank to the floor by the entrance and leaned on the wall, fishing through her bag until she found Hermione's copy of _Gadding With Ghouls._ She flicked past the bulky author foreword.

Hermione appeared soon, as promised, walking with a marginally more alert Elara, who was listening to something Daphne Greengrass was saying. The rest of the Slytherins arrived before the Gryffindors—the latter of whom descended with their usual loud raucous centered around L0ngbottom. The Boy Who Lived grinned when Seamus mimicked driving a car and laughed.

"Longbottom," Draco said, narrowing his eyes at the taller boy. "Did you and the Weasel _really_ crash a car into the Whomping Willow?"

The Gryffindors snickered as if in on a good joke, and Longbottom shrugged, the corner of his lips quirked. "Even if I did, why would I tell you anything, Malfoy?"

Draco flushed and mouthed off while Crabbe and Goyle scowled. Harriet, still sitting on the floor with her book, was tempted to tell Malfoy he shouldn't try to be clever since it never seemed to work out for him—but she opted for Slytherin solidarity and said nothing. Elara offered her hand, and Harriet used it to get to her feet.

The classroom door slammed open, putting an effective end to the squabbling in the corridor. Neither House was inclined to go inside; Hermione proved the bravest of the lot by crossing the threshold first, though she did take hold of Harriet's sleeve and drag her in after her. The ill-lit room was as eerie as she recalled, the bones of skeletal creatures casting patterns on the walls, the professor standing still as stone at his lectern with his black robes gleaming in the torchlight like a snake's skin.

Harriet gulped.

Professor Slytherin said nothing as they hurried toward their desks, though his red eyes followed their movements easily enough, a small, cold smile fixed over his mouth. Harriet stuffed _Gadding With Ghouls_ away into her bag and took out her wand, laying it on the desk before her. She missed the weight of Livi's coils and wished she was back in the dorm with him, still sleeping.

Slytherin stepped out from behind his lectern, and a hush fell over the room.

"Welcome to your second year of Defense Against the Dark Arts," he said, lacing his hands together before himself. "You know who I am. Again, I will be your instructor, your guide, into the enticing and perilous realm of the Dark Arts—and ensuing protections, of course. You have been under my tutelage for a year; some of your number have learned well, others…." He sneered, eyes flicking toward the Gryffindor side of the room. "No matter. You have another chance to prove yourselves competent. Last year, we concentrated on the manifestation of shields. This term, we will venture into the use of offensive spells."

"Like dueling?" Dean blurted out.

"Two points from Gryffindor, Thomas," Slytherin said, barely tilting his head to acknowledge the question. "No, not ' _like dueling_.' I will not be instructing you in dueling. I do not waste my time with ineptitude."

Harriet wrinkled her nose as she watched the wizard idly pace. Why wouldn't he teach them dueling? That seemed strange to her.

"You have been taught the theory and basic use of the Knockback Jinx and have witnessed its use prior in this class. Today, you will learn its practical application. Longbottom!" Slytherin swished his wand toward the opposing end of the aisle, summoning the familiar crimson lion marker. He smirked. "To your mark."

The Boy Who Lived scowled, but showed better restraint than Harriet thought someone else might have when he nodded, rising from his desk to go stand at the glowing lion.

"You have already had experience, Longbottom, and so I expect some semblance of competency from you. Demonstrate the Knockback Jinx upon me."

A few students shared curious looks, and most of the Gryffindors leaned forward in their seats, eager to see their top student jinx the Head of Slytherin. Even Neville grinned, though he was quick to hide the expression when he lifted his wand and faced the professor. "Of course, sir. _Flipendo!_ "

The jinx came quick, like he meant to take the wizard off guard, but Professor Slytherin merely flicked his own wand, and a wordless shield appeared before him, absorbing the spell. "Again."

Twice more Neville fired the Knockback Jinx, and twice more Slytherin deflected it with nothing more than a twitch of his arm. "A passable effort. Sit down, Longbottom."

He did as said, and Professor Slytherin called on Zabini, who took his place at a green snake marker and proceeded to throw spells at their instructor. Harriet could tell the difference in Zabini and Longbottom's casting as soon as he began; Neville's jinxes, when they connected with the barrier, sent ripples through the opaque distortion, whereas Zabini's seemed to strike a solid obstacle. She guessed their spells had differing strengths.

He called on Goyle next—who managed nothing at all—and then Dunbar, who made an acceptable effort, though her third jinx fizzled out before it could actually hit Slytherin's shield. Elara did better, but she didn't show the same competency as Longbottom, and Weasley's wand seemed to be malfunctioning, since it backfired and turned the boy's hair blue.

Harriet watched like the rest of her classmates, but as she watched, her mind drifted back to a chapter she'd read in the " _Compendivm_ " Elara had given her at Yule. The book was thick, and much of it proved beyond either Harriet's comprehension or attention span, but she did recall a section that spoke on magical control. She'd been interested at first because she hoped it might share a few tips to ensure her Transfiguration attempts went less awry, but instead Harriet had read about the importance of stance and movement, how the body acted to build a kind of momentum and applied additional force to outgoing spells.

Magic really was much more complicated than she would have guessed a year ago.

"Miss Potter. You're next."

Harriet blinked, then scrambled to her feet—nearly forgetting her wand on the desk. She snatched it up, then hurried over to the waiting mark on the far end of the aisle, her stomach flopping about in her middle when she faced the waiting wizard. Professor Slytherin arched a brow. "Anytime now, Miss Potter."

Feeling the impatient eyes of her classmates upon her, Harriet shoved aside her thoughts on the _Compendivm_ and did just as she'd seen the others do, flicking her wand at the wrist, calling out, " _Flipendo!_ "

The jinx flew down the aisle. In an instant, Professor Slytherin summoned yet another non-verbal shield, and Harriet's spell dissipated against it without anything more than the slightest of ripples. Neville, on the Gryffindor side of the room, snorted, and his cohorts grinned as if half of them hadn't already failed the bloody exercise. _He's like Dudley_ , she fumed, heat suffusing her cheeks. _Every time I went up to the board in class to spell a word or solve a problem, he laughed—no matter if I was wrong or right_.

Grinding her teeth, Harriet lifted her wand again. Instead of merely flicking it, she stepped into the motion, brought her arm forward, and shouted, " _Flipendo!_ "

The jinx shot across the space between her and the professor just as it had before. However, when it impacted the summoned shield, the barrier shuddered, the resulting _thwack!_ loud enough to hurt their ears, and Professor Slytherin's eyes widened a fraction as his feet slid several inches on the stone floor. The class gasped.

Emboldened, Harriet lifted her wand again. " _Flipendo!_ "

She couldn't say _how_ she knew it, given that the wizard was using only non-verbals, but the moment he threw up his shield, she _knew_ it was different from the simple one he'd used before. This time, his feet didn't slide and the barrier didn't ripple; Harriet's jinx struck the shield—and then it came flying right back at her. She didn't have time to do anything more than flinch before it hit her, and she slammed into the floor.

Harriet must have passed out, because next she knew, she blinked open bleary eyes to find Professor Slytherin leaning over her, a cruel scowl fixed on his face. For a moment, she felt as if she'd seen those glinting red eyes somewhere else, leering at her in her dreams from the thick shadows of the cupboard, behind every nightmare vision of Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia, reflected in the Mirror of Erised. She felt cold and terrified.

"Shite," Harriet wheezed when the ache in her back and neck became apparent. _He changed spells. He knew that would happen. Why would he do that?!_

"Be prepared to catch whatever you throw," Professor Slytherin hissed, straightening. He turned away, robes flaring, and returned to his place at the head of the room. "Five points from Slytherin. We don't curse like Muggle filth in my classroom, Potter."

Trembling, Harriet returned to her seat.


	59. leaves of green

**_lix. leaves of green_**

When Friday finally arrived, Hermione—for all her love of lectures and learning—was looking forward to the weekend.

Their first week back had been…trying. Not for any _specific_ reason, but rather an annoying culmination of many small, frustrating reasons. Elara, dealing with an influx of legal letters concerning the House of Black estate, stayed awake late into the night at her carrell in the dorm and was noticeably shorter with the rest of them—mostly Pansy, who had recently taken to wearing floral perfumes that triggered the Black heir's allergies. Katherine had acquired a new cat who did _not_ get along with Millicent's, prompting several arguments between the two witches, and more than once they ended up with Prefect Farley in their dorm, chastising them for acting like naughty children.

Draco had taken to continuing his summer behavior, namely irritating and nagging Hermione until she felt very near hexing him just for a moment of silence. He harped on and on about the new brooms his father had ordered, the ones that would be arriving just in time for the tryouts next week, his unveiled enthusiasm pestering not only Hermione, but several of their upperclassmen and their unfortunate peers. Somehow, he always seemed to be _there_ , trailing along behind her in the corridors with Gregory and Vincent, the two larger boys long since inured to Malfoy theatrics. His voice grated on her nerves.

Harriet was especially annoyed by Draco, and each time he started in on another meandering "my father did this, my father did that" spiel, she made an inconspicuous exit from whatever room the Malfoy heir and his goons were inhabiting. Hermione knew Harriet wanted to play Quidditch and didn't think it even remotely fair she would probably be denied trying out simply because Lucius Malfoy could throw away gold on racing brooms for the whole team. It _wasn't_ fair, and yet the insidious social hierarchy in Slytherin House they'd thus far been spared from couldn't be bucked, and Hermione imagined they'd run into problems with it again and again as they grew older.

Elara was aware of the silent hierarchy as well. That was why both Hermione and the severe witch would subtly turn themselves and Harriet away from certain couches in the common room, away from places at Slytherin's table, why they paused and let specific students walk before them in the halls. There was an unspoken rule in their House about showing respect to your _betters_ , and for all that Hermione fumed at the notion of having _betters_ , she picked her battles and kept her head down.

The philosophers knew change did not occur overnight, even with magic. The most potent potions brewed for months or years, and they always had the best results.

The Slytherins left Defense on Friday eager to reach the greenhouses out on the grounds for Herbology. The first breath of fresh afternoon air invigorated Hermione after spending the last hour trapped in the dark classroom with Professor Slytherin and their surly Gryffindor peers. Harriet mumbled invectives as they walked from the castle into the warm sunshine, and even Hermione didn't have the heart to chastise her language after watching the girl be put upon by their cold professor.

Hermione was aware the bespectacled witch had seen their Head of House over the summer in Diagon Alley, and while Harriet had insisted nothing had happened in their meeting, whatever _had_ occurred had shifted Professor Slytherin's behavior from indifferent to almost malicious. He pushed Harriet harder than any of them, and Hermione couldn't say _why._ He never incanted aloud during their lessons, but she _knew_ he changed his shields from the basic _Protego_ form simply to throw Harriet off—or to literally throw her, as was the case today.

"He's a foul git," Harriet whispered so others wouldn't overhear, one hand rubbing the small of her back. She uttered these words without the same begrudging admiration she held for Snape, who was also often denounced as a 'bloody git' for his sarcastic tongue and keenness for detention. "He almost squished Kevin."

"Aren't you supposed to leave him in the dorm?"

"No, I'm supposed to leave Livi in the dorm. Kevin is harmless." She lifted her other hand from her pocket, revealing the Transfigured golem wrapped about her fingers, his tiny fangs sinking into her knuckle. Hermione lifted a brow and Harriet blushed. "Well, he's upset because he almost got squashed, Hermione! He's _usually_ harmless—ow, Kevin!" Her voice curtailed into intelligible hisses.

Hermione just shook her head and pondered Professor Slytherin's curious behavior as they crossed the courtyard and came upon the section of grounds given over to the greenhouses and Hogwarts' other agricultural pursuits. Plump Professor Sprout waited for them there with a box of earmuffs under her arm, and she smiled at the mingling Slytherins and Ravenclaws as they approached. "Good afternoon, lads and lasses! First class of the year, and I've something exciting lined up for us."

Next to Harriet, Elara paled, her face decidedly pinched.

"We're in Greenhouse Three today. This way!"

They trailed after her like ducklings, Harriet snickering as she poked Elara's arm. "Don't murder anything too rare today, Elara."

"Be quiet, brat. I just need gloves."

Hermione shook her head again and rolled her eyes as they entered the humid greenhouse, the smell of flowers and earth filling her nose. Several tables with barren pots encumbered the middle of the space, and Professor Sprout took Elara by the arm without a word, positioning her away from what looked like a valuable Venomous Tentacula. Elara flushed but didn't protest the move, Hermione and Harriet coming to stand with her.

"Oh, hello Terry, Anthony!"

The two Ravenclaws found places across from them at the table, and both greeted the three Slytherin witches with pleasant grins. "Hi, Hermione. How's your first week back treating you?" Terry asked as he pulled on a pair of gardening gloves.

"Well enough," she replied, hesitating. "Defense has been a bit…."

Anthony snorted. "Brutal?" Hermione nodded, and he and Terry exchanged knowing looks. "We've heard from a few upper years that Professor Slytherin's classes grow more intense with every year you matriculate."

 _You mean it's worse than it is now?_

Next to her, Harriet frowned as she adjusted her glasses, her gaze unusually intent upon the empty pots before them. "He told us he wouldn't be teaching us dueling. Does he _ever_ teach dueling?"

"No," Terry responded, shrugging. He accepted the bag of mixed soil for their table from Professor Sprout, wrinkling his nose at the odor. "He was adamant on that point in our class."

" _Why_ though?" Harriet asked with exasperation. In truth, Hermione was curious as well; she'd thought dueling a significant part of _defense_ , if a bit specialized, but Slytherin restricted them to theory and relative application in his classroom. He'd claimed he did 'not waste his time with ineptitude,' but that was hardly an excuse in Hermione's opinion. All students were inept until taught!

"It's obvious, isn't it?" Anthony said with a raised brow, showing a hint of that Ravenclaw shrewdness. It wasn't obvious to Hermione—a fact that rankled to no end—and so she barely stopped herself from pouting when Elara, spilling manure into her pot, answered.

"He doesn't want others to observe and disseminate his weaknesses. Students often share the strengths and weaknesses of their masters in any subject; in dueling, learning the soft spots in an apprentice's skill can reveal soft spots in their master's."

"Quite right." Anthony grinned, but then quickly sobered. "My great-aunt told me _he's_ the reason that Dumbledore, you know—." He waggled his right arm—indicating the Headmaster's lack of said limb. "And that's _Dumbledore_ , the wizard who fought and took down _Grindelwald_! Old Slytherin probably has enough enemies, you know? Doesn't want them getting the drop on him."

"That's preposterous," Hermione snapped. "If _he_ was the one who—who _mutilated_ the Headmaster, I highly doubt Professor Slytherin would be teaching here!"

"I'm just telling you what I was told. My great-uncle's good friends with Dumbledore—Newt Scamander, he is. He was there when Dumbledore dueled Grindelwald, and he says he can't imagine the kind of skill or power that could best the man."

Hermione couldn't imagine it either. For all his dotty ways, Professor Dumbledore radiated competency, and was quick as a whip with his wand—even while using his left hand. _No one truly knows what happened to his arm. The rumors say he lost it seven or eight years ago now, but if he HAD lost it in a duel with Professor Slytherin, he wouldn't have allowed the man to teach here, would he? Or did the Board override him? No, no, Hermione, that's…that's mad. Highly improbable._

She refused the thought of how 'highly improbable' she found most of the wizarding world.

"That's enough chatter now, quiet down! Take a pair of earmuffs from the box coming around." The box in question landed on their table last of all, and the two boys quickly dove in to avoid the pink, furry pair floating near the top. Elara ended up with that pair, much to her apparent displeasure. Next came the smocks, which they shrugged on over their arms to protect their robes from whatever activity they'd be doing today.

"Now," Professor Sprout said, flicking her wand, bringing forward a grubby cart burdened with heavy clay pots. Hermione studied the spiked tops of the plants inside those pots—and suddenly the earmuffs made much more sense. _Mandrakes_. _Of course! "_ Can anyone tell me what we have here?"

Hermione's hand shot up, as did a few of the Ravenclaws', and Professor Sprout nodded to Hermione with an indulgent smile. "Mandrakes," Hermione said, feeling smug. "Specifically _Mandragora Offininarum_ , as evidenced by the curvature in the leaves, not to be confused with _Mandragora autumnalis_ , or _Podophyllum pataltum_ , an American variant."

"Excellent response, Miss Granger! Take five points for Slytherin."

Hermione smiled—until she heard Draco hiss at the table next to theirs, his mouth twisted in mockery, though the sentiment fell flat, as ridiculous as he looked in his overlarge gloves and stained smock. "Do you have to regurgitate a textbook every time you open your mouth, Granger?"

"Bugger off, Malfoy," Harriet snarled too low for Professor Sprout to hear, the witch carefully placing mandrakes before everyone with stern warnings not to touch them yet. "Anything's better than listening to the shite that comes out of yours."

"How crass. You'd best watch yourself, Potter."

"Or what? Are you going to tell Crabbe and Goyle to punch a girl?"

"I'm not gonna punch a girl," Crabbe grunted.

"My mum would box my ears," Goyle added.

Malfoy glowered. "You two are _worthless_."

Professor Sprout reached their side of the greenhouse and set out more mandrakes. Going by the chastising glint in her eye, Hermione guessed she'd heard some of what had been said. "No mucking about today, am I understood? You're second years, and that means we'll be dealing with finickier flora from now on, and my plants deserve your full attention. Understood?"

A low chorus of " _Yes, Professor Sprout,_ " echoed from the accrued students.

"Miss Granger, can you tell us why we'll be needing our earmuffs today?"

"Because the cry of a mandrake is fatal to any who hears it." The class took perceptible steps back from their tables and the waiting plants. "The cry of a _full-grown_ mandrake is fatal, I should say. Sorry, Professor."

"Very good, Miss Granger. Take another two points for Slytherin. Now!" She clapped her hands together, bits of dry clay flaking from her worn gloves. "These mandrakes here are still toddlers, but they've outgrown their current pots and need to be replanted. Their cries won't kill you, but they will put you out for a good few hours, so when I give the word, I want you all to put your earmuffs on and make sure they're snug. I'll demonstrate with this first one, and then you'll be working with your own—gloves _on_ , Miss Black."

"Yes, Professor Sprout."

The older witch nodded, then gestured for them to don their earmuffs, Hermione fussing with her hair until the padding lay flush against her skin. A Dampening Charm on the earmuffs further reduced noise, until all she could hear was the thump of her own heart and the faint whistle of her breath. Professor Sprout grasped the base of the green stalk, and then yanked upward.

Hermione had seen the illustrations before, but nothing could have quite prepared her for the reality of seeing a squalling, lumpy, hideous and infant-like root being pulled from the dirt.

Professor Sprout plopped the displeased mandrake down into the larger pot already partly filled with soil, then used what was left in the sack to pour more around the mandrake until it disappeared underneath. She gave the class a wave, then took off her earmuffs, signaling for the others to do the same.

"There! Not so hard, right? Once earmuffs go on again, no removing them until I give the signal. Everyone ready? Okay! Earmuffs on!"

The next forty minutes of class passed in silence as the second-years fought and struggled with their temperamental mandrakes. Truly, Professor Sprout made it look easy, when the planting in actuality proved much more difficult. The mandrakes flailed, kicking and punching, tiny, toothless mouths biting hard through their padded gloves. Roger Malone's plant put up such a fight, it knocked his earmuffs askew and he ended up sprawled on the greenhouse floor, out cold. Professor Sprout hurried over, gesturing for the rest of them to continue their tasks.

With half of her mandrake submerged, Hermione paused to wipe sweat off her brow—and happened to glance up just as Elara nipped off a few of her own mandrake's leaves, carefully folding them into a piece of parchment before sticking that parchment into her robes. Their eyes met, and Hermione mouthed, " _What are you doing?_ "

Frowning, Elara shrugged, then pretended she didn't see Hermione's questioning stare.

 _What is she up to?_ Hermione wondered—though, she _did_ have an inkling as to what the taller witch might want mandrake leaves for. _But she wouldn't do THAT, would she? Oh, she could get in so much trouble!_

Hermione's eyes flickered to Harriet—Harriet, who kept a magical snake as large as a python under her bed, and sometimes under her shirt.

Hermione was not reassured.

When class ended, they stripped off their gloves and grubby smocks, sweaty and tired and more than ready for dinner to commence in the Great Hall. "What are you on about?" Hermione demanded of Elara, careful not to be overheard. Draco made as if to follow them—but one look from Professor Sprout had him, Crabbe, and Goyle going on ahead, leaving Hermione, Elara, and Harriet to trail along behind the departing students. The sun shone warm and golden still, though evening was not far off.

"Nothing."

"Don't _nothing_ me, I'm not thick." Hermione pointed at the pocket Elara usually kept her old, worn journal in. "You're not thinking about—about doing _that,_ are you?"

"And if I was?"

"Well, I'd have to say how utterly _reckless_ it'd be! You could get arrested, or die, or be _expelled_ —!"

They came to a stop when Elara raised her hand and pointed to Harriet, who'd stepped from the path and left the courtyard, walking down the grassy slope toward the lake. Unease pulled at Hermione's heart; of course, she knew it was silly to get worked up over such a simple diversion, but Harriet had nearly _died_ several times over the last year alone, and seeing her suddenly stroll away from the castle where the professors dwelt had Hermione's pulse jumping. _Where is she going?_

They followed, and Harriet headed to the bottom of the hill, one hand on her bag, a familiar blonde standing barefoot at the water's edge.

"Hey, Luna!" Harriet called, drawing the attention of the new Ravenclaw witch. "Whatcha doing?"

Luna blinked, and looked first at Harriet, then at Hermione and Elara, before turning her gaze once more to rippling shallows. "Oh. I was looking for Plimpies."

"For _what_?"

"Plimpies. Little round fish with long legs and webbed feet."

Harriet looked in the water too, then shrugged. "I've never heard of those before. You should probably come back and look on the weekend. It's almost dinner time, and curfew for the first, second, and third years is just after that. We're not supposed to be on the grounds once it starts getting dark."

The grass crunched under approaching feet, and a burst of red appeared in the corner of Hermione's eye. "Luna!" Ginny Weasley shouted, relief evident in her voice. "Why'd you wander off without saying anything?"

"Hi, Ginny," Luna said, seeming oblivious to the other girl's distress. Ginny gave Harriet a considering look as she went to Luna's side—and Hermione wondered if it was because of their House, since she hadn't displayed the same reticence on the train. Gryffindors proved rather intolerant of Slytherins—and vice versa, typically. "They're quite nice, you know. Especially for Slytherins."

Hermione bristled. Elara didn't react, but a flash of hurt flickered through Harriet's face before her expression stilled.

"Yeah?" Ginny commented as if she didn't believe what Luna said. _For Slytherins._ "Well, c'mon, let's get to dinner…where are your shoes this time…?"

The pair moved off, and Harriet rejoined Hermione and Elara, her face blank, eyes on the bent blades of grass. She stuck her hand into her robes and brought out Kevin, fiddling with the Transfiguration golem until he was coiled about her fingers—shiny, freshly scabbed bite marks on her knuckles from his tiny fangs.

"Harriet…."

"We're going to miss dinner," the bespectacled witch said, speaking softly. "Let's go."

She set off at a fast clip before Hermione could say anything else. The breeze rustled in the forest's eaves, and the lake moved at their backs, the Giant Squid a distant spectator on the gleaming surface, basking in the late afternoon light.

"It bothers her," Elara spoke first.

"What does?"

They started walking again, one of Elara's hands in her robe pocket. "People's perceptions of Slytherins."

"I don't think Luna or Ginny meant anything by it, really. It—with people like Malfoy around, misconceptions are bound to arise."

"But it still bothers her."

Hermione pursed her lips, recalling the hurt in Harriet's eyes and her own irritation when hearing that qualifier, " _For Slytherins._ "

She noted how Elara kept hold of the parchment concealing the mandrake leaves, and instead of broaching the subject again, Hermione bit her tongue. No, she wouldn't say anything. Friends supported one another—even in their most reckless ambitions.

If her friend wanted to dabble in Animagus transformation, who was Hermione to argue?


	60. mischief

**_lx. mischief_**

"Of course, the Two Thousand One blows the Two Thousand model out of the water, both in speed and in handling. Normally, I wouldn't claim there's much of a difference between models—but Nimbus Racing really outdid themselves this time. The oh-One is a complete departure from its predecessor. It makes Loser Longbottom's twig look like—."

Elara snapped her Charms text closed and shut her eyes, searching for the patience she used to employ to get through Father Phillips' worst Sunday sermons, when she'd sit between Matron Fitzgerald and Kaleb Sanders on the pew, the latter calling her the devil under his breath, the former pinching her side every time her attention wandered. She could still hear his voice like the bang of a hammer on a stubborn nail, " _Many will say to me in that day, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? And in thy name cast our devils? And in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from ye workers of iniquity_."

 _Workers of iniquity_ , Elara hissed in her thoughts, eyes squeezed shut. _Like he would know iniquity if it came and smacked him in the face._

Draco blathered on, leaning on a wing chair by the main hearth, chatting in the ear of the sixth year Hubert Fawly, who didn't much care for the sport itself as he did the money to be made off of it. The longer the blond boy waxed poetic about the broom, the more tempted Elara was to write his mother. Oh, for certain Mrs. Malfoy thought the world of her boy and Draco could do no wrong in her eyes, but boasting like this was grossly uncouth. Narcissa would chastise him.

Despite her misgivings, Elara found she didn't _dislike_ Mrs. Malfoy—or, at least, the etiquette lessons she gave her and Harriet. Elara had nice manners. She had to, given the sisters in St. Giles' were quick to swat elbows off tables and nag anyone who lifted a cup of tea with all five fingers braced on the tableware. Mealtimes were always stressful there, but Elara _had_ learned, unlike Harriet, who'd admitted—after much interrogation—that she'd never been permitted at the family table like a person before Hogwarts. She hadn't been struck like Elara, but in many ways the neglect Harriet experienced seemed worse.

Etiquette lessons gave them both a way to better immerse themselves in wizarding society, so no matter how boring Elara thought the revision, she…appreciated the time Narcissa Malfoy spent teaching them. Half the clergy had been of the opinion women and children should stand about silent as halfwits, so at the very least Elara was happy to know witches were not usually considered idle trophies for chauvinists.

It wasn't very _ladylike_ to hex prats, however, no matter how they ran at the mouth, and Elara didn't want to cross Narcissa. She had enough trouble with Lucius poking and prodding and stirring up issues for her with the Ministry. She was _twelve_ for God's sake, and she had to spend far too much time cross-referencing Mr. Piers' letters with the dictionary just to understand what her solicitor was doing to secure her House and complete due diligence.

A quiet snap stirred Elara from her deeper ruminations, and she glanced across the table to Harriet. The bespectacled witch was staring very hard at her splotched Potions essay, which she'd have to rewrite, since Snape didn't accept messy work. Her hand formed a fist around her broken quill—and, in the background, Draco continued to talk as if he'd already made the Quidditch team.

"Harriet…?" Hermione asked, pausing in her discourse about the Guild of Ethical Potioneering and Standards and their stance on the Shrinking Potion, the subject of Harriet's essay.

"Sorry," Harriet said, letting go of the quill. "Sorry, I—I think I'm just going to go to bed." She pushed her things into a messy pile and shoved it into her satchel before flinging that over her shoulder, leaving behind nothing but the broken quill and a decided air of frustration. Hermione, lips pursed, watched her go, and then glanced toward the common room's main hearth.

"It isn't fair," she whispered, glaring at the blond boy, but given how far their table was situated from any of the hearths, Elara doubted anyone could see them beneath the silver lanterns. "It's ridiculous. There must be _someone_ we can go to."

"He's not doing anything wrong, technically. Bribing is so prevalent because it is difficult to _prove_ , Hermione." Elara rubbed her temple, exhaling. "Besides, if we threw a fit over this, it'd deprive the whole team of new racing brooms. We're hardly popular as is; Harriet would have no chance at the team then."

Hermione scowled but didn't seem surprised, having undoubtedly considered the idea before. Elara spent another ten minutes sitting there, tracing the bent corners of her Charms text, during which Tracey Davis—who was horribly stuck up for a half-blood without an actual House—came over and started asking Hermione about the Potions essay. Elara excused herself and headed toward the dorm.

"—just prove you're halfway decent, Malfoy," Flint was saying, slouched over on one of the better couches. "Old Hooch is already suspicious, and I ain't starting the year out with a penalty _again_. Slytherin would be right pissed."

Malfoy scoffed and tossed back his head, adopting a low timbre in an ill-attempt to disguise his prepubescent voice. "Don't be absurd. I've been flying since I was a baby—we even have our own pitch at the manor, you see. Not regulation, but good enough—."

Elara sucked air through her teeth as she entered the corridor housing rooms for Slytherin's female population, lost in thought. The dorm she shared with the others was empty despite the encroaching curfew for the younger years—aside from Harriet, who sat at her messy carrell, hunched over and scribbling with her quill.

"What's that?" Elara asked.

"Working on a letter to Mr. Flamel," Harriet grumbled in reply, clearly still irked by Malfoy's behavior. She scribbled out a line on the parchment, leaving behind inky streaks. "Hermione's translated the first few chapters for me—y'know she found a translation Charm in the library? It's a bit finicky, but it's really useful."

"I know, she showed me."

"So I can read enough of the book now to thank him. It's interesting." Harriet scratched out another line, concentrating. "I was going to ask if he knew any curses I could use to throw prats off their fancy broomsticks, but I decided that probably wasn't my brightest idea."

Elara snorted as she leaned on the shelves next to Harriet and picked a discarded sweet wrapper from the desk, flicking it into the bin. "No, probably not. I'm sure we can find something on our own anyway. I _do_ own a library full of dubious Dark books, remember?"

Scoffing, Harriet discarded her draft, crumpling the parchment in her fist. "Yeah, I remember. Elara…do you think I'm making a fuss for nothing? I mean, it's just Quidditch, right? I don't _need_ Quidditch—and I could always try out later, for Chaser or something, when the Chasers leave." Even as she spoke, Elara knew Harriet's heart wasn't in it. She'd been excited to try for Seeker. "I should probably just be happy the team has new brooms."

Elara opened her mouth—and paused, thinking, remembering. She recalled wanting to be in the choir at St. Giles', not because she could sing, but because everyone else had been part of it, and the Matron relegated her to the piano. She thought of all the similar times she'd been told to be thankful for what she was given and to not _want_ , and Elara imagined Harriet's own childhood had been riddled with identical circumstances. She _was_ thankful for so much in this life, but it wasn't a crime to _want_ , and to be upset when what one wanted was taken away so unfairly.

 _Be thankful_ , Matron Fitzgerald used to snap. _In some places of the world, girls like you still get stoned to death, Miss Black._

"…Are you going to the tryouts tomorrow?" she asked, staring at the silver lantern overhead, brow furrowed.

"Not much point, is there?"

"I think you should go."

"Really?"

"Yes. Malfoy still has to sit a broom; if he can't, then you'll have your chance."

Harriet heaved a sigh, but didn't argue. Instead, she changed the subject. "What d'you think Tonks would like for Yule?"

Elara dropped her gaze from the lantern, puzzled. "Yule?"

"Yeah, I was going to get gifts for our minders. It seemed like a good idea." Harriet shrugged, then gave her a cheeky grin. "I was going to sign both our names, of course, so if they hated anything, I could say it was your idea."

Elara scowled, and Harriet laughed. They argued over prospective thank-you gifts, noticeably skirting the subject of potentially having to give _Snape_ something, until the other girls filtered into the dorm, yawning and dragging their feet. Elara got ready for bed, but once she slipped behind her hangings and laid down, she didn't sleep. Instead, she listened to the muffled movements of the other Slytherin girls, the lights dimming when Prefect Farley came to make sure they'd settled in, though the moonlight still threw weak, watery ripples on the ceiling through the windows.

She didn't know exactly how long she stayed there, unmoving, though it was certainly long enough to doze for a time and for Millicent's snoring to interrupt the Black Lake's gentle roving. Elara peeled open heavy eyelids and, grunting, sat up, feeling about in the dark until she laid her hand on her wand, and then the slim, leather-bound book she kept hidden in her nightstand drawer.

The dungeon floor nipped at her feet when Elara stood. Still, she forewent her slippers and shrugged on her dressing gown, wand and book in hand, pulling back the hangings inch by inch so the rings wouldn't drag on the rail. It was quiet—aside from the snoring, and the soft, low breaths escaping the sleeping girls, though Elara _did_ hear Livius rustling about in his nest below Harriet's bed. Pocketing her spellbook, she was quick to move on before anyone woke.

Out in the corridor, Elara stopped before she could step into the common room, hanging back out of sight as she peeked around the corner. No one was about, having wandered off to their own beds hours ago, leaving the hearths to smolder and shed guttering light through the cavernous space. Elara squinted in the gloom at the painting above the mantel; Harriet had warned both her and Hermione against the watching snake depicted therein, but Elara couldn't see the creature at the moment. Good.

"What _are_ you doing?"

The furious whisper coming from behind her almost killed Elara. She dropped her wand and whispered "Jesus Christ," before she could catch herself, clutching at her hammering heart as she whirled about to see Hermione standing there in her night things. "You scared me!"

"Never mind that!" Hermione whispered as Elara picked up her wand again. "What are you doing, sneaking out of the dorm? If any of the teachers catch you out in the castle after hours—!"

"I'm not leaving the common room."

"Not leaving the—?"

"Shh!"

Elara hurried quietly across the main floor to the opposing corridor, keeping her eyes open for movement—either painted or corporeal. To her credit, Hermione didn't hiss her name again, though she did follow closely at Elara's heels, her face set in grim condemnation. That condemnation twisted into confusion when Elara stopped before the door to the second year boys' dorm and withdrew her book from her gown's pocket.

"Elara—."

"Just keep a lookout." Elara lit her wand with a muttered _Lumos_ , bringing the book closer to her nose. She found the proper spell and, pointing her wand at the door's handle, whispered, " _Colloportus._ "

The lock gave a small click when it closed, and both witches held their breath, waiting, listening hard enough for their heartbeats to sound loud and threatening in their own ears.

Hermione didn't need further explanation to realize what Elara was on about. "They'll unlock that in no time," she said. "It won't stop him from going tryouts."

"No, but this will." Elara flipped a page and studied the depicted diagram, watching the little wizard move his hand. " _Epoximise_."

Nothing happened.

"Is that the Permanent Sticking Charm? _Where_ did you find that?"

"It's not," Elara whispered, darting a quick look around the narrow corridor. "There's a counter for this one, but it's obscure. It will take time to undo. _Epoximise!_ " Again, nothing happened. Elara sucked in a miffed breath through her nose and tightened her hold on the book.

Hermione, for all her misgivings on their current situation, rolled her eyes and whipped out her own wand. "You're doing it wrong."

"No, I'm not, I'm doing it just as it is in the book—."

"Watch." Hermione flicked her wand and gave it more of a swish than Elara had. " _Epoximise!_ " The door's wood groaned as it adhered itself to the frame. Elara ignored Hermione's smug grin, and the bushy-haired witch flourished her wand again. " _Silencio!_ That should hold through practice. Hopefully. I haven't practiced it much."

"Yes, but you're brilliant. It'll stick." Elara and Hermione shared mischievous smiles, then turned back to the common room, dismissing their wand light. It was still silent but for the lake's movement and the gentle tapping of their cold, bare feet on the stone floor.

"You don't think we should tell Harriet, do you?"

"No. She won't like it."

"It's not cheating. Not—not _precisely._ "

"Of course not," Elara murmured, lowering her voice more as they entered their own dorm again. Millicent continued to snore. "Like Flint said, Draco needs to sit a broom to secure his spot. It's not _our_ fault if he doesn't show up, is it?"

* * *

 **A/N: Elara - "Nice dreams you got there, Draco…be a shame if someone…" *dramatic closeup* "RUINED THEM."**


	61. flightless bird

**_lxi. flightless bird_**

The summer breeze came warm and unexpected over the loch, filled with newly curled leaves already falling for the autumn not quite upon them, though hints of it lingered at the Forest's borders. Out in the sunshine, however, it grew hot, and Harriet welcomed the breeze as she leaned on the stands at her back, elbows propped on the seat. Her legs swayed back and forth, toes barely skimming the grass, and out on the pitch the Slytherin team ran their drills.

Harriet shut her eyes and soaked in the warmth like a lounging reptile. She missed Livi, and made a mental note to ask Hagrid that afternoon if she could spend time on the grounds with him. Of course, she didn't think Hagrid would say _no_ , but if he did, she would probably bring Livi out anyway, and avoid Snape like the plague. He'd ignored her and Elara for the most part, concentrating his vitriol on Longbottom and the Gryffindors—but Harriet knew it wouldn't take much for him to remember all the times they'd been impertinent over the summer hols, and then they'd really be in for it.

Despite the heat, Harriet shivered.

Adrian Pucey and Graham Montague whipped by overhead, voices jubilant, chased by one of the team's Beaters, Peregrine Derrick. Other Slytherins dotted the length and breadth of the stands, watching the team enjoy their new brooms, or just using the tryouts as an excuse to get out of the castle for a bit. Terrance Higgs stood next to Marcus Flint, their heads bent together, deep in discussion.

She was the only person to show for the Seeker position, given Malfoy's rambling had scared off anyone else's interest. Harriet kept expecting to see the pointy-faced bastard come swaggering onto the pitch, but the longer she waited, the more mystified she became. _He knows he's supposed to be here_ , Harriet thought. _What's his game now?_

Flint crossed his sizable arms and suddenly kicked the chest containing the Quaffle and Bludgers. The latter banged against the trunk's lid, and with a shouted word to Derrick and Bole, the Beaters flew down to release the balls. Pucey and Montague quickly scooped up the Quaffle when it was thrown into the air, and Bole batted both Bludgers away as he and Derrick took to the skies again.

Higgs shook his head again and Flint hit the trunk a second time.

Harriet stopped kicking her feet and, for wont of anything else to do, took out _Gadding With Ghouls_ from her robe pocket, finding her last bookmarked spot. Gilderoy Lockhart was about to confront Perry Fidious, who'd been using ghouls to terrify Muggles into leaving a village so he could purchase the land on the cheap. Gilderoy bounded into the locked barn housing the captured creatures and said, " _You have become a fool, Perry Fidious, and yet pitiable. You might still have turned away from folly and evil, and have been of service. But you choose to stay and gnaw the ends of your own plots._ "

Harriet paused, rereading the last line.

 _Gnaw the ends of your own plots._

That…that was _familiar_ , but where had she heard it before? Harriet was certain she'd come across the line, and it hadn't been in _Gadding With Ghouls_ —which, in all honestly, read suspiciously like the cartoons Dudley would watch in the morning, all very showy and unsubtle. _Where_ had she seen the phrase before?

An hour passed, then two. The Chasers landed, as did the Keeper Bletchley, the three huddling close with Flint and Higgs as the team had some kind of secret meeting.

Feet thumped on the wooden steps, and Harriet looked up to see Elara and Hermione walking over, the pair sharing a brief, furtive argument before they straightened, finding seats next to her. Elara didn't look much different in her monochromatic weekend attire, which Pansy loved to deride, though Hermione wore a pretty green tartan skirt and a new blouse. "Is practice over?" the latter asked, glancing toward the assembled team.

"I dunno," Harriet said, brow quirked at the obvious attempt to shift attention back to the pitch. "Malfoy hasn't shown up yet."

Hermione and Elara both looked straight ahead. "Oh, well. How unfortunate."

"Unfortunate…?"

A commotion on the field interrupted Harriet. "What is the problem, Mr. Flint?" Harriet hadn't realized Madam Hooch was here, but the hawk-eyed instructor strode out toward the Slytherin team all the same, clearly irritated about something. "I'm here to supervise tryouts for your new Seeker—and though I've been here twiddling my thumbs for more than two hours, I've yet to see a single candidate!"

"Our, err, main hopeful isn't here yet, ma'am."

"Oh? Would this be the _hopeful_ who so charitably donated all these new brooms?" she demanded. Flint flushed despite himself, a furious glint in his hard, beady eyes. "I don't put my nose in House business, Mr. Flint, but I will not stand aside and allow such a blatant display of bribery come to fruition when your _hopeful_ cannot even deign to attend their own tryout!"

"It ain't bribery, Madam Hooch!"

"No? Then observe one of your other _hopefuls_." With that, the flight instructor whirled about and jabbed a sharp finger toward Harriet, who flinched like the witch had chucked something at her. Dressed in trousers and a plain green shirt, she was obviously the only one dressed for flying. "You! What's your name, girl?"

"P-Potter, ma'am."

"Potter. You're here to tryout for Seeker, yes?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Then get over here."

Harriet hopped to her feet—dropping _Gadding With Ghouls_ —and scuttled onto the pitch, moved by the force of Hooch's voice. The older witch sent one final warning glare in Flint's direction before she stomped over back to her position on the shaded bench. Coming closer to Flint, Harriet found herself craning her head back to meet the towering boy's glower.

"You better not be mucking about, Potter," he seethed through crooked teeth. "Hooch is brassed off enough without you fucking about."

"I'm not."

"And I guess you don't know where that prat Malfoy is at either, do you?"

"No." Though Harriet had a sneaking suspicion Elara and Hermione might.

"Then get on a broom and take a lap."

Harriet hurried over the empty chest, by which lay two new, gleaming brooms—one for Flint, and one for the prospective Seeker. The team towered over her, all a good head and shoulders above the short witch in height, sneering at the nervous girl as she passed through them and stuck her hand out above one of the brooms. She didn't need to say anything; it leapt into her palm, and Harriet clasped her fingers about the handle.

She threw one leg over the broom, feeling the Charms hum to life with tangible heat against her skin, Charms far stronger than the ones she'd felt on the old school brooms. In hindsight, she should've expected the speed of it—but Harriet kicked off a little too hard, compensating for a lack of mobility not present in the Two Thousand One, and almost went arse over elbow into the sod. Snickers rose from the Slytherin team as Harriet blushed scarlet, ears burning as she re-situated herself on the broom and tried again.

The second attempt went far smoother, and as Harriet leaned her weight into the flight, shifting on instinct, she picked up speed and relaxed her nervous grip. The wind howled in her ears, sliding through her hair, cold after sitting in the sun for so long, her cheeks pink with a sunburn Hermione would chastise her about later. She completed her first lap, and then went on into a second, pushing herself faster, enthralled with the effortless speed and smooth, sinuous glide. Malfoy hadn't been bluffing about the broom's qualifications.

The Slytherins were far less inclined to mocking when she slowed by them, though they didn't look entirely pleased, either. "I'm lettin' the Snitch out," Flint snapped. "Give it a minute head-start, then I'm timing how long it takes you to catch it, Potter!"

She did as instructed, and it took her only a minute to spot the wayward sparkle of gold in the corner of her eye and dart after it, returning to Flint with the Snitch struggling in her small hand. He set it free twice more, and both times Harriet found it, smirking at the Chaser torn between being miffed and excited. "Derrick, Bole—get that bag of—what're they called? Dolf balls?—get that bag and start hitting em' up there!"

The _golf_ balls—and honestly, Harriet wondered how Flint didn't know about _golf_ of all things, the blinkered idiot—were soon whizzing through the air, the loud smack of the Beater bats striking the little balls echoing across the pitch. Harriet flew after the balls, catching each one, tossing them back toward the watching team. They didn't let up until Harriet dipped too low in a dive and ended up skinning a knee against the ground, at which point Hooch intervened and told Flint to end practice.

She landed by the team, weak-kneed and winded, Hooch and her friends crossing the grass to join them. "Well! Excellent flying, Miss Potter. Truly exceptional," Hooch said, clapping her gloved hands together before taking out her wand and pointing it at Harriet's knee. The shorter witch jolted at the answering sting as the scrape healed, but she nonetheless muttered her thanks. "It seems to me you've found yourself an excellent Seeker, Mr. Flint."

Marcus pursed his lips. The rest of the team exchanged uneasy looks, gripping their new broomsticks tight, before they all shrugged. "Yeah," Flint grunted. "I guess you're right, Madam Hooch."

Tired as she was, Harriet still grinned from ear to ear.

"Excellent."

Madam Hooch made to leave the pitch, which also left Harriet standing under Flint's harsh, unhappy scrutiny. The Quidditch captain took the Nimbus from her and laid it with the others. "All right, Potter," he snapped. "You've got potential—but this ain't like a real match, and you know bugger all about our strats. You won't be late to a single practice, you hear me?"

"Yes."

He scoffed, thick brow furrowed. "Bloody Malfoy," he muttered, heaving a heavy, bothered breath. "There's a track out by the lake we're allowed to run on, and I suggest you use it, half-blood. You're the right build for a Seeker, but you're too scrawny for a long game. One blow from a Bludger and you'd be out, and the winds during the winter storms we play in aren't to be arsed with. You need more stamina than you have now. You got it?"

"Yes," Harriet said again, because she'd say anything at this point, all but bouncing on the balls of her feet. "I understand."

"Fine. Welcome to the team, Potter."

The rest of the players echoed Flint's sentiment, some with more enthusiasm than others, and the captain called an end to the tryouts. The balls went back into the chest, and Harriet could barely wait for the older Slytherins to wander off before throwing herself at Hermione and Elara, arms going about their necks, very nearly bringing Elara's head down hard on Hermione's.

"Yes!" she crowed, laughing. "I can't believe it. I really can't. Malfoy was going on and on about how much he wanted this—but where is he? Flint _told_ him to show up half a dozen times with most of the House listening, so what's he playing at? He—." Harriet paused, drawing back to spy Elara and Hermione's passive, innocent faces. "…what'd you do?"

"Do? Do what?" Hermione asked, fussing with her hair. "No need to be _paranoid_ , Harriet. I'm sure Draco is just—." She looked to Elara for help.

"Detained."

"Yes, detain— _no_ , not _detained_ , not really—."

Harriet laughed again before she could help herself, too pleased for much else, giddy with expectation. She was fairly sure practice would prove harder than she expected, given how peeved Flint was with Malfoy skiving off tryouts and forcing him to accept Hooch's appointment of Harriet. She would work hard despite whatever her teammates threw at her, however, because nothing beat the feeling of wind against her face, the world falling away below her feet. It was exhilarating.

"D'you think lunch is still on? I'm famished."

"No, lunch will be over by now. Honestly, Flint kept tryouts going far longer than he should have."

"I didn't even notice."

"Madam Hooch did, which is why she forced him to make a decision."

Harriet hummed low in thought as she gathered _Gadding With Ghouls_ from her spot in the stands and they set off out of the stadium, her heart considerably lighter than it'd been on the way down. She'd done it. She'd made the team. "Thanks for convincing me to come, Elara."

The taller girl smiled slightly, the corner of her lips hitching upward. "Nothing ventured, nothing gained, as they say."

"John Heywood said that," Hermione put in. They came out from under the stadium's shadow, beginning their uphill hike toward the castle. "In his ' _Dialogue Containing the Number in Effect of All the Proverbs in the English Tongue._ '"

" _Of course_ you'd know that, Hermione. No other rational human being would."

"He said ' _Noght veter noght haue spare to speke spare to spede_.' I remember it because the translations in that passage argued about whether Heywood actually said the phrase, or if he stole it from an earlier French proverb."

Harriet glanced at her. "Well, that just sounds like gibberish to me."

"It means ' _nothing ventured, nothing had; if you don't speak, you don't advance—_.'"

"POTTER!"

All three witches paused, halting Hermione's impromptu and somewhat anxious lecture on John Heywood's blathering as Draco Malfoy came storming out of the upper courtyard in a high fury, Crabbe and Goyle struggling to keep up with his stride. Color flushed his normally pale face, his tidy hair in a terrible disarray, robes disheveled and wrinkled.

"This is _your_ fault!" he howled, balled fists trembling as he marched down the hill. "You _lying_ , scheming little half-blood! You bloody well _cheated_ , you foul—."

"What are you on about?" Harriet demanded, scowling. "I haven't done a thing to you."

He stopped about a yard from them, sneering. "If it wasn't you, then it was one of your dirty blooded cronies—."

"Your accusations are totally baseless, Draco," Hermione interrupted, voice gone high—which, Harriet noted—was a sure sign the girl was lying. _What did they do?_ she pondered to herself, not entirely sure if she should be pleased with her friends. She wanted to play, yes, but what type of trouble would Malfoy stir up? Was it worth it?

"I wasn't talking to you, Mudblood!"

"Don't call her that!" Harriet shouted.

"I'll call her whatever I like—."

During their argument, which had only grown in volume, Elara began smirking, and when Draco's flashing eyes suddenly darted to her, the taller witch grinned fully—a harsh, victorious grin that set Malfoy off. "Did you have trouble getting out of bed today, Draco?"

Enraged, he grappled for his wand, pointing it at them, snarling, " _Flipendo!_ "

Harriet had her own wand in hand before he could incant his spell, and her shield sprung to life, hurling the hex right back into the blond boy's pointy face. There was a loud, sudden _crack!_ and Malfoy hit the grass, sliding a few centimeters, blood gushing from his busted nose.

Of course, this was the part at which Professor Snape came wheeling out of the courtyard, black robes billowing behind him, only to find Harriet standing over a bloodied, whimpering Malfoy with her wand drawn.

The expression on the severe wizard's face could have withered thunderclouds.

"Detention, Potter," he said, voice cold, furious. "For a _week_."

Harriet's jaw dropped. "But I—."

"Sir, it wasn't Harriet's—."

" _Do not make me repeat myself_ ," Snape hissed as he loomed over their quivering group. The sunshine and warm, balmy air seemed to crawl away from him, and Harriet had to wonder if there really was some merit to those rumors about him being a vampire. The great ruddy bat. "Go to the common room. I will see to Mr. Malfoy."

"But—."

" _Go!_ "

Harriet and the others didn't need to be told again. The three witches—plus Crabbe and Goyle—tromped into the castle proper and delved into the dungeons' waiting dark, leaving behind the blissful daylight and laughter drifting up from the grounds. Harriet didn't dare look back for fear of seeing Snape following in their shadow.

It was a wretched end to an otherwise great day.

* * *

 **A/N: Sorry for the wait. Had finals and I'm graduating. *throws confetti.* So here's a chapter!**


	62. nameless thing

**_lxii. nameless thing_**

Harriet took each step down into the dungeons with a heavy, indignant huff.

This detention wasn't fair. It wasn't her fault Malfoy was a prat, it's wasn't her fault he couldn't show up to tryouts on time, and it most certainly wasn't her fault he wound up bloodied on the grass; Snape couldn't blame her for the berk's own spell rebounding off her shield and smacking him in the face. No matter where the blame lay, however, Snape seemed determined to ruin Harriet's mood, and upset anger heated her face.

 _It's not fair_.

Her knuckles hit the Potions' classroom door with unnecessary force.

"Enter."

Harriet did as bid, knowing better than to throw the door open and let it bounce on the wall like Snape did, because she'd been cuffed upside the head enough times by Uncle Vernon to understand slamming things about wouldn't win her any points. She thought it might make her feel a bit better, but the detention hadn't even started yet, and the great bat sounded like he was already in a mood.

She found Snape standing behind his own desk at the head of the room, the space lit by the eerie, sputtering green flames coiling beneath an active cauldron, the sharp angles of the wizard's face rendered gruesome and grim as he leaned over the rim. He didn't look up at Harriet, instead concentrating on his work, two bottles Charmed to hover overhead and tip their contents into the bubbling stew at even increments as Snape stirred with one hand and incanted spells with the other.

Awkward, Harriet stood at the side of the desk, and her anger deflated without anywhere to direct it. "Err, professor—?"

He flicked his wand toward the entrance. The door crashed shut, stealing what little light from the corridor managed to sneak inside, and Harriet's heart kicked the inside of her ribs. The professor moved again, and a few of the torches bracketed to the walls sputtered into life.

"Sit, Potter."

Harriet sat at the closest desk, which—given the ink, quill, and parchment laid out on its surface—had been prepped for her arrival. _Guess I'm doing lines tonight._ She unfurled the parchment's top, and let out a huff as she read the first sentence already written in Snape's spidery script.

 _I will think before I act like an imbecile._

Snape looked up from his cauldron. "Problem, Potter?"

Glowering, Harriet met the man's black stare and said, "Not at all, professor."

"Then you had best reassess your attitude, as I will not accept any disrespect from you in my classroom."

Her anger sparked again, and before she could stop herself, Harriet blurted out, "It's not fair!" Knowing Snape's stance on _fair_ , she rushed on to explain, "I didn't _do_ anything! Malfoy attacked us!"

Snape sneered, the green light of the flame catching on his crooked teeth. "Oh? You did _nothing_? Nothing at all?"

"Nothing!"

"Then how is it Mr. Malfoy wound up on the ground with a broken nose, hmm?"

Harriet hesitated. Technically, she _had_ done _something_ , hadn't she? If not exactly what Snape thought, she still took out her wand and cast a spell. "Well, I—."

"Exactly," Snape said without letting Harriet finish her thought. "You did _something_ , and for that _something_ , you are in detention. If you think Mr. Malfoy escaped without his own form of punishment, then you are _mistaken_ , and it is not your place to second guess how I discipline my students—be it you, or him."

"I didn't do anything wrong!"

"Miss Potter—."

"It's not _fair!_ "

"Silence!" the professor snapped, his hand stilling on the cauldron's ladle. Harriet realized she'd been shouting, and color flushed her cheeks. All the same, she refused to lower her gaze from Snape's. "I told you, I will not tolerate disrespect in my classroom. Write your lines."

"But—."

" _Write_."

Biting back an irritated sigh, Harriet snatched up the quill, dunked it in the inkwell, and began to messily scrawl out the bloody line she was meant to copy. The first copy, and the second, resembled chicken scratch more than actual words, but by the time Snape returned to his potion and she reached her tenth repetition, the prickling in her neck subsided, color fading, and all that remained was the day's exhaustion. Harriet dabbed at her parchment, grousing over Snape, over Malfoy, over his stupid fat head and his stupid father buying the whole team brooms. All this drama, simply because he wouldn't try for his spot like a _normal_ person.

"I didn't attack him, sir," Harriet said into the quiet, speaking softer than before. "I just used a Shield Charm."

The ladle made a solid _thunk_ as it came to a stop against the rim, and Snape straightened, flicking his hair back with a negligent jerk of his head. He placed both hands on the edge of his desk and leaned forward as if he, too, was tired. "You are not in detention for attacking a student, girl. You are in detention because you did not think."

"I don't understand."

Snape's eyes narrowed. "Don't be an idiot. You have been at Hogwarts long enough to know there is a certain bias against our House, Miss Potter. You are not a Gryffindor; you do not have the luxury of acting first and begging forgiveness like those in the saintly house of red and gold. This time, it was an inner-House feud, and I was the one to come upon the scene; next time, it might be Longbottom you throw in the dirt, and it won't be me, but rather someone who goes running with the story to the Daily Prophet, smearing your name and reputation over a pointless schoolyard tiff."

"But I—." Harriet paused, fiddling with the quill. The Potions Master had a point, she knew. Sometimes, in primary, Dudley would chase her somewhere out of bounds, using his ruddy friends to herd her in, and by the time a teacher found them, it'd be her that was in trouble yet again. No matter how she argued, it always stood that Dudley was in the right, and she'd been caught red-handed. _Perception_ was an important tool in learning to get along. "I didn't even mean what I did, though. It was just—an instinct."

"Which is all well and good in dueling, but you are not an animal, and you are not controlled by those instincts. You must hone them to obey _your_ whims, not the other way around. I have no plans to stand as a character witness at your Wizengamot trial when you're charged for accidental murder simply because you _acted on instinct_." He snapped his fingers and a cutting board popped into existence, clattering on Harriet's desk, followed by a knife and a bundle of knotgrass. "Dice. Three-fourths of an inch."

Harriet took to her new task with better spirits, since dicing a plant beat scrubbing cauldrons or writing lines or whatever other unpleasant tasks Snape could whip out of his sleeve. "What was I supposed to do, professor? Just let Malfoy attack Elara?"

"Yes." Harriet wrinkled her nose and, without glancing at her, Snape rolled his eyes. "Black is an emancipated, proxy-Head of her House, and—to be frank—a girl. Draco would have come out much worse in this idiotic confrontation had she been the one with the broken nose and not him. After you and your little friends pulled your Quidditch coup—." A pointed look stopped Harriet from arguing. "Mr. Malfoy will be searching for ways to undermine your privilege and see you removed from the team. Him bloodying Black would have brought censure upon Mr. Malfoy."

Harriet chopped at the green shoots in front of her with more vigor. _Stupid blond prat._

"I said _dice_ , not _pulverize_ , Potter…."

They worked in silence for a while, interrupted only by the cauldron's lazy bubbling, the study tapping of the knife on wood, and the occasional, soft winnowing of Snape's magic as he spelled diced knotgrass into the forming concoction. Harriet mulled over everything he'd said about Malfoy, and found she had very little taste for such things; honestly, she'd much rather just hex him and get it over with than muck about with mind games, but Professor Snape wasn't wrong. Hadn't it been instinct that threw her fist into Ron's mouth last year? Snape told her off then, too, and she'd been stuck elbow-deep in mucky cauldrons for most of the night.

No, Harriet didn't believe she'd be able to stand aside and let Malfoy curse her friends, but she could be smarter about it, couldn't she? She always lamented not being as clever or quick-witted as Hermione or Elara, but she didn't want to be a twit like Goyle or Crabbe, who always acted with their fists instead of their brains.

Sighing through her nose, Harriet kept dicing, pausing only to scratch at her neck and rub her tired eyes. "Professor?" she asked.

"What?"

"Why are there so many different Shield Charms? And why do they act funny against different spells?"

"Define _funny_ , Potter."

"Well, I mean, I read books that talk about different Shield Charms, yeah? And they all say different shields react in certain ways against different spells, how some are better used here instead of there, and I don't understand how people know when to use those shields, cos' your opponent's not going to announce their attack, are they?"

"Some fools do, or as good as," Snape muttered. Pausing in his brewing, the Potions Master straightened and considered her question, tracing a long finger against his chin in thought. "Dueling tests not only your knowledge of spells, but how you read your opponent and interpret their spellcraft. In competitive dueling—or in true battle—many spells are incanted silently, and it is up to you to understand your opponent's body language, and consult Birch's Law."

"Birch's Law?"

Professor Snape jerked his head in a nod, then picked his black wand up off the desk to wave over his cauldron, a still, blue mist settling atop the liquid, bringing it to stasis. "Slytherin doesn't teach proper dueling, so I doubt he touches upon the principle much in his classes, but I know Professor McGonagall will be instructing you about the theory in your fourth year or so, if you dunderheads prove receptive to the concept. Birch's Law, also known as a spell's V.E.R.D, encompasses the properties of viscosity, elasticity, refraction, and density." As he spoke, Snape flicked his wand at the blackboard behind him, and his familiar handwriting crept across the dusty expanse. Harriet wriggled her spoiled parchment out from under the cutting board and started taking notes.

"Viscosity examines the magnitude of a spell's internal friction. Elasticity, simply put, examines a spell's propensity for _bouncing_ , and is not as vital in rough dueling as a full comprehension of refraction, the dispersion of VIBGYOR—violet, indigo, blue, green, yellow, orange, and red—light. The colors descend the refractive index; violet spells are incredibly difficult to deflect, whereas red spells are not. Density, or the compaction of a substance, measures the energy amassed within a spell, and in relation to its viscosity and elasticity, affect its deflection. Spells of incredibly low density with a high refraction index and little elasticity can rarely be reflected and thus need to be dodged or intercepted."

Harriet scribbled as fast as she could, not interrupting, because Snape seemed lost in his own lecture, and Harriet didn't want him to change his mind about giving her this information—even if it did sound impossibly complicated.

"Different variations of the Shield Charm exist to reach and counter the various VERDs of dangerous spells, but reaching the higher refection index requires a faster vibration of energy, and thus tires the witch or wizard out faster should they continually incant powerful shields against meaningless assault. On the inverse, a witch or wizard on the offensive would be best served by an arsenal of spells relatively low on the refraction index and thus less powerful, but less likely to wear on the user before they can break their opponent's defenses. The ENT, or Elemental Negation Transformation, can supersede a spell's VERD, which is how a water shield low upon the refraction index can neutralize or counter a more powerful fire spell—." Snape paused, coming back to himself, and turned on Harriet, the muscle in his jaw working. "Is any of this penetrating your thick skull, or am I wasting my breath?"

"Some," Harriet admitted, stifling a tired yawn, still copying the information he'd thrown onto the blackboard. "I don't understand how anyone could think about all this during a duel, though."

"The key is memorization, Potter—and, should that fail you, knowledge of stance and color theory. Magic travels in certain ways through the body depending on the desired spell and its effects. Wizarding societies to the east refer to the various _chakra points_ in the body, from which they theorize different spells originate, depending upon their elemental base. Harnessing these spells is done with different gestures and manipulations of the wand or hand."

Harriet scratched her neck, smudging ink on her collar. "Hermione once told me most Charms are tossed and hexes are thrown."

"A simplistic explanation, but suitable for your purposes. Charms are 'underhand,' whereas many curses and heavier spells are 'overhand _,'_ yes." Snape exhaled and rubbed his forehead. "In simple terms, dodge spells colored green, blue, indigo, or violet. They will be more difficult, or impossible, to counter."

Harriet scribbled this final note at the bottom of her sheet, wanting to ask " _What if you can't dodge?_ ", but she guessed that's what the rest of his theory spiel had been all about. Maybe she could write to Mr. Flamel and ask him about it. He could probably explain with more patience than a tired Snape.

Setting the quill aside, Harriet folded her notes up, the ink quick to dry. Snape wasn't paying attention to her; he balanced a hip against the desk's solid lip and leaned upon it as he studied the board, lost in fathomless thoughts far beyond Harriet's comprehension.

"Professor Slytherin always throws my spells back at me," she commented, continuing with the rest of the knotgrass. Shifting, Snape returned to the cauldron and set about clearing his station. He waved a hand over the flame and it went out.

"Obviously."

"He does it on purpose. No matter how—how _hard_ I throw my spells, his shield proves stronger."

The wizard produced several crystal vials from his robe pockets, then used the ladle to dribble the sickly mixture into each one until the potion was gone. "We did have a discussion about you using your head, did we not? _Think_ , Potter. What would you have to gain by getting past Professor Slytherin's shield? _Nothing_."

"I am thinking! I just want to do it once. Just to prove to myself that I can." Harriet squeezed the knife's handle, remembering the utter terror that seized her when Slytherin had leaned over her the first time, hissing " _Be ready to catch what you throw._ " She knew nothing good could come of besting her proud Defense Professor at his own game, and yet….

Snape considered her as he dismissed the cauldron back to the counter by the dripping sink. He appeared to be having a silent argument with himself, a losing argument, one he finally settled with an irritated grunt. "Don't concentrate on breaking through his shield. You haven't the repertoire to breach his defenses, even on a negligible level, but he will underestimate you. Part of dueling—not that Slytherin would ever engage in an honest duel with a student, Potter—is controlling and manipulating your environment, as well as your opponent. What is the floor in the Defense class made of?"

"Um?" Baffled by the strange question, it took Harriet longer than it should have to say, "S-stone? I think."

Snape pinched the bridge of his nose, then manually wrote the numbers "2.5" to "3" with the abbreviation "g/cm" and a little floating three on the board. It looked suspiciously like maths to Harriet. "Use Granger to help you find a spell whose elasticity reacts with this density. Aim for the floor at Slytherin's feet. Most variations of the Shield Charm protect only the torso and head, but his barrier will be powerful and extend to his ankles. Should you succeed in finding the proper spell, it will ricochet off the floor, dip below his shield, and hit him." Snape's eyes hardened again. "If you go through with this fool's errand, be ready to face the consequences of his displeasure."

Harriet took out her notes again, printed the numbers, and underlined Hermione's name twice, knowing that her friend could make much more sense of Snape's information than she could at the moment. Apparently, some spells bounced and some didn't, some were sticky and some weren't, and different shields blocked differently colored hexes and curses because of something called _refraction._ Her nose wrinkled as she considered how much more difficult dueling was than just pointing your wand at someone.

 _Well, it'd have to be,_ she thought, stuffing the parchment away again. _Sure, I could block Malfoy easy enough—but he's twelve and doesn't know anything yet. If everyone could get by with a simple Shield Charm, I doubt Voldemort would have gotten anywhere at all._

Snape gathered the completed vials together, levitating several when his hands were filled. "Finish the knotgrass," the wizard instructed before swooping away, heading toward the storage cupboard on the opposite side of the room. Harriet heard the cupboard door swing open on its decrepit hinges, then swing shut—and she took the opportunity to quickly dice the rest of the grass shoots, doing a shoddy job, but finishing the task in seconds. She wanted to get back to the dorms and talk to Hermione before she went off to bed.

 _He won't notice if they're not all three-fourths of an inch, right? Right?_ He probably would, but hopefully not until Harriet was several corridors away.

Spotting a cleaning rag left on the professor's desk, Harriet hopped to her feet and went to grab it, thinking she should tidy her workspace before Snape returned—when a sound stopped her cold.

" _Sso hungry…sso hungry…."_ A voice breathed, tickling at her ears, seeming to come from nowhere and everywhere—from Harriet herself, even. " _Let usss kill…let usss rip…blood, yesss…let usss tasste_ —."

"Potter?"

Jolting, Harriet spun too quickly on her heels and fell against Snape's desk, bruising her back on the hard, unyielding wood. Surprised by her reaction, Snape did little more than stare at her, brow raised. "…Potter?" he repeated, voice less stern.

"I—. D-did you say something?" she asked, voice gone high, eyes wide. What had that voice been? Had she imagined it? Surely if Snape had heard someone whispering about killing someone he wouldn't be so composed. It _was_ getting late, and though Harriet had never been one to hear voices before, Quidditch had tired her out, and stressing over her detention for the remainder of the afternoon had wrung her of what energy remained. The voice reminded Harriet of that nameless, terrifying thing in her nightmares, that harsh crooning clawing at the inside of her head, oozing from the dark places in the cupboard and between the floorboards at Grimmauld and from behind Professor Slytherin's every barbed word—.

 _It's not real,_ Harriet told herself, swallowing. _It's never real._

She strained her ears, but she heard nothing aside from her heart's rapid beating and the very slight rush of Snape's breathing.

"Yes, I told you to leave your mess and get out of my sight." Snape furrowed his brow. "…what are you doing?"

"I—tripped," Harriet stuttered, as if the man hadn't just witnessed that for himself. "Do I—do I have detention again tomorrow? Professor?"

Scowling, Snape said, "No. I have better ways to spend my evening than minding disrespectful brats. I will forget the rest of your detentions for this incident. Don't make me regret my leniency, Potter."

"I won't." She scrambled to her feet, straightening her robes and glasses. "Can I go? Sir?"

The suspicion hadn't left his face yet, but Snape just frowned and crossed his arms, black robes falling around him like a bat's wings closing for the night. "Yes. Leave."

Muttering good night, Harriet bolted for the door—and she didn't stop running until she was safely shut inside the Slytherin common room, leaving behind the sullen Potions Master, the sickly smell of knotgrass, and all creepy, imagined voices whispering in her ears.

* * *

 **A/N: Harriet - "…You mean I can't just yeet the wand out of their hands?" Snape - "…no." Sorry for the gratuitous magical theory.**


	63. apology

**_lxiii. apology_**

When the morning light came creeping through the lake's shallows and Harriet opened her eyes to the dappled green glow warming her bedsheets, she could little remember the eerie voice she'd heard in the dungeons the night before. Indeed, the whole evening felt fuzzy to Harriet, and if it weren't for the rumpled sheet of parchment she unearthed from her used robes, she would have thought it all just another strange dream.

She stared down at the page, touching the spidery letters at the top, and thought, _Snape was in an odd mood._

Being a Sunday, Millicent and Pansy still slept, the latter snoring into her silk pillows, but the rest of the beds were empty and made, leaving Harriet to make her way into the washroom on her own, getting ready for the day. Livius stuck his nose out from under the bed's skirts when she returned, but he otherwise remained quiet, content to remain in his nest, the Warming Charm thrown over his blankets by Hermione. Kevin went into his favored pocket in her robes.

Once washed and dressed, Harriet grabbed her school bag and headed into the common room, but found neither Hermione or Elara there. She continued out of the dorms into the castle itself, and—yawning all the while—meandered to the library.

She ended up taking the wrong corridor twice, passing a bust without a face three times, and each time she did, it asked her odd, raspy questions. Finally, she found a portrait of a witch herding geese who was kind enough to point out the proper path—interrupted by loud, obnoxious honking every other syllable—and Harriet managed to get to her destination.

"There you are, Harriet," Hermione said, lifting her head from a yellowing tome as the bespectacled witch wandered over to the table. Others sat with Hermione, including Elara—slumped in her seat and half-asleep—the Ravenclaws Terry Boot and Anthony Goldstein, and—surprisingly—Ginny Weasley and Luna Lovegood. The two first years looked up when Hermione spoke.

"Hello, Harriet," Luna said, pale eyes wide as they faceted on the other girl.

"'Lo," Harriet replied to Luna and the table in general, taking the seat left open at Elara's side. The taller witch dragged her own bag off the chair with a tired grunt. "Bit keen for studying on a Sunday, aren't you all?"

"You missed breakfast," Hermione informed her with an imperious arch of her brow. "So no, it's not early at all, really."

Elara and Weasley seemed to disagree, but neither chose to say anything. The latter had dark circles under her eyes and appeared paler than usual behind her numerous freckles, and though her bias against Slytherin still stung, Harriet asked, "How are you, Ginny?"

Ginny shrugged.

Madam Pince made her rounds, lurking like an angry, well-read vulture, and so their conversation subsided, the two younger students consulting what looked like Hermione's Transfiguration notes from the year before while Hermione tackled a Charms project with the Ravenclaws and Elara paged through a Herbology text, working on a supplemental essay for Sprout.

Harriet took out her notes from the evening prior and, smoothing the sheet against, neatly tore off the bit holding her lines, leaving behind her hasty scribbles about Birch's Law.

"Hermione?" she asked, getting the other witch's attention. "D'you know anything about Birch's Law? Or—VERD?"

"VERD?" Anthony said before Hermione had the chance. "Professor Flitwick told us we won't touch any of Horwell Birch's theorems until well into our fourth year—and only in Arithmancy, after we cover Agrippa."

Hermione clicked her tongue. "Birch's theorems aren't strictly Arithmancy. VERD, in particular, is covered in other subjects beyond Arithmancy, Anthony. Especially in Defense."

Terry snorted. "No. Too close to dueling practice, and the older Ravenclaws tell us Professor Slytherin doesn't teach anything resembling proper dueling."

"Why do you ask, Harriet?" Hermione said, ignoring Terry, who shared a smirk with Anthony. "Is this for class?"

"…You could say that." Harriet slid the parchment to Hermione, who reached over her amounting stack of texts to pick it up and bring it closer to the light coming through the open window.

"Merlin, your _handwriting—_."

"I know," Harriet interrupted a bit testily. "I rushed to write all I could."

"Was this in—?"

"Yes," she interrupted again, eyes flicking toward the Ravenclaws, then away. "We got onto a bit of a tangent."

"I'll say." Hermione squinted and brought the parchment closer to her nose. "You're looking for a spell that will rebound against a density two point five to three grams per cubic centimeter. You're going to need an equation for that—." With a lazy gesture, Terry reached and snatched the parchment from Hermione. "Boot!"

"It's stone," he said—also squinting when he tried to decipher Harriet's smudged words. "A non-porous stone. Granite, mayhaps. You're looking for a spell that'll bounce on the castle's floor or walls."

"You don't need an equation for that," Anthony supplied, grinning. "After all, experience is the best teacher, isn't it? I say, most of our first-year curriculum should rebound, shouldn't they, Terry?"

"Theoretically. It also depends upon a spell's inertia. A _flipendo_ usually dissipates upon hitting a solid obstacle, but I've seen it ricochet when it hits with enough force."

"Don't encourage her to go throwing hexes at the walls hoping they bounce back." Hermione took the parchment back, scowling, and handed it to Harriet. "What's this for, anyway?"

"Just some, um, extra credit?" Harriet winced at the weak excuse. "I'll show you the assignment later."

Clearly there wasn't an extra credit assignment under the sun Hermione hadn't heard about and completed, and so she opened her mouth to question Harriet—when Elara nudged her chair with her foot, expression flat, knowing. Hermione's mouth snapped shut, lips thinning.

"There should be books on Birch's Law over there," Elara said, tipping her chin across the library toward the far stacks. "If you're interested."

"Thanks."

Harriet stood and wandered in the direction Elara had indicated, though she shied away from the idea of unearthing some thick, overzealous book from the Stone Age filled with maths and equations and a thousand other things that would make her head hurt. Reading something like that was always a chore, but if she wished to write Mr. Flamel, she needed a better grasp on the subject, lest she sound like a bumbling fool wasting his time with simple nonsense. With that thought in mind, Harriet entered the dusty section devoted to Magical Theory and Laws.

Ten minutes of searching provided little insight, and Harriet slid a dusty scroll on Abu Musa Jabir's nonsensical ramblings back onto the shelf, reaching for another.

"Harriet?" Startled, the bespectacled witch turned to find Ginny standing a few paces away, looking uncertain about what she was doing there exactly. She fiddled with the ends of her red hair and waited for Harriet to look at her before speaking again. "Listen, I just wanted to say I'm—sorry, about what happened at the lake before. It wasn't right, I know. Ever since I was little, my brothers have always filled my head with all these stories about Slytherins being terrible and liars and—." Ginny paused, fiddling with her hair again, tugging hard on the edges. "Did you know our mums got on?"

Harriet didn't know that, and she didn't know why Ginny brought it up. _What's her angle?_ "No," she said slowly, choosing her words and another book. "I don't…I wasn't told a lot about my parents." _Nothing at all, if it wasn't a bunch of lies_.

"My uncles were Aurors who worked with your dad supposedly, and so the—Potters were invited over a lot. My mum was gonna have Ron and your mum was gonna have—well, have you—and so they became friends." Ginny colored. "I wrote a letter home, and I…mentioned you. Mum told me about being friends with Lily Potter. I just—felt silly, after she told me that. You, Elara, and Hermione were really nice to me and Luna, and I should've known my brothers were having me on. So I'm sorry."

"I understand," Harriet said, because she _did_ understand—but she did not say it was alright, because it _wasn't_. Why did she always have to apologize for her House? People always liked to whip out the fact that "Merlin was a Slytherin" when defending Slytherin's honor—but the bloody wizard hadn't been at Hogwarts for a thousand years! Harriet didn't like that Slytherins always had to make up for some slight, some perceived injustice done by others in their House, how the Dark Lord's shadow seemed to stretch wide and sully those who didn't have a thing to do with him. It wasn't Ginny's fault, and yet it irked Harriet all the same.

The feeling sat heavy and convoluted in Harriet's stomach, but she shoved it away, because she appreciated the image Ginny painted; her dad and mum with friends, being invited over for dinner, enjoying life. She did, however, change the subject. "You look tired, Ginny," she told the other girl, reading the spine of another tome. She couldn't make heads or tails of the language. "Are you liking Hogwarts?"

"Yes," the other girl said, perhaps a bit too quickly. "I do miss home, though. I haven't been getting enough sleep."

"Doesn't Gryffindor have a curfew? Our prefects are strict about it."

"We do, but the prefects don't seem to care much. My brother Percy tries to bully us off to the dorms, but he forgets to get to bed himself with all his studying. The common room's loud because—." Ginny suddenly flushed a darker red than her hair, and Harriet thought steam might come flooding from her ears at any second. "…because of Neville Longbottom."

The last words came out in a worshipful hush, and Harriet didn't fight the urge to roll her eyes, though Ginny couldn't see, not with her face pointed at the shelves. _Bloody Longbottom._

"He's…he's not really how I'd thought he'd be," Ginny admitted, quietly, as if she didn't really mean want to. "He's great, of course! But he's…."

"People rarely live up to their reputations, good or bad." Harriet took down another scroll, checking the title. She had no desire to hear Ginny Weasley wax poetic about the Boy Who Lived. Not after what she learned at the end of last term. "If he's keeping you up, tell the prat to be quiet."

Ginny's eyes grew round as Galleons. "He's—he defeated You-Know-Who. You can't call him a p-prat."

The Headmaster's voice came back to Harriet, echoing " _he is no more the cause of Voldemort's downfall than myself or this candy dish_ ," and though the absurd imagery peculated a kind of quiet hilarity in her head, Harriet didn't find the sentiment very funny. She was still bitter over the years she spent in the cupboard while Neville Longbottom had lived the kind of life she still couldn't properly imagine.

"I'll believe it when I see it," Harriet muttered.

"What?"

Harriet cleared her throat, pretending she didn't hear the question. "Listen, Ginny. Neville and I don't get on. I mean, you probably don't want my advice, yeah? But, you should form an opinion based on who he is, not what he's done." _Supposedly done_. "He's just another student. I can't speak for him, but he'd probably appreciate someone trying to see him for who he is."

Harriet left then, walking from the stacks empty-handed, ignoring her friends' questioning looks as she resumed her seat and dug out her own Charms essay instead. She'd continue her research later, when she had time to tell Hermione and Elara exactly what happened in detention, and when she had the opportunity to do as Anthony said, and test which spells would work best for getting past Professor Slytherin's shield.

Across the table, Luna smiled—a vacuous, if friendly, gesture—and though Harriet tried to return it, her heart wasn't in it.


	64. kill a king

**_lxiv. kill a king_**

"This has got to be the _worst_ idea you've ever had."

Hermione, Elara, and Harriet stood clumped in the sunlit corridor beyond their Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom, waiting for the door to finally open. Hermione spoke the thought aloud, just as she had for most of the morning, and for most of the Monday prior to today, shaking her head each time Harriet discreetly took aim at the hard, stone floor and fired another low-level hex at it. They were late for Transfiguration yesterday, having to stop by the infirmary after a forceful _furnunculus_ struck Harriet in the face, and Hermione's best efforts to reduce the swelling proved fruitless. Madam Pomfrey didn't believe their excuse about a misfired spell, and Professor McGonagall gave them a tongue lashing for their tardiness.

Elara—who was not as opposed to the occasional spot of mischief—kept frowning.

"I can't believe Professor Snape would encourage this," Hermione whispered. "This is exactly the kind of thing he usually tells us _not_ to do!"

"He might have a reason," Elara muttered. She eyed Draco, who stood nearest them, and though he kept sending murderous glances in Harriet's direction, he otherwise remained deep in conversation with Nott. Hermione knew he'd sent several letters home, and given how sullen his mood had been on Sunday and Monday, she gathered Mr. and Mrs. Malfoy weren't overly impressed with his whinging—or his being bested by a bunch of underage witches.

"How so?"

Elara shrugged, attempting nonchalance, though she kept wringing her hands inside her sleeves. "We know Professor Slytherin has…favorites." This was true. Several of the older Slytherins often boasted about earning their professor's regard, and though Hermione admitted to preening whenever professors praised her work, compliments from Professor Slytherin always carried a double-edged bitterness, scarcely given, and yet just as cutting as his insults. "Maybe this is Snape's way of making sure Harriet _doesn't_ become a…favorite."

"Maybe this is his newest attempt to get Harriet murdered."

The witch in question huffed, readjusting her glasses, shifting her weight from foot to foot. "You know it was Quirrell who tried that, Hermione."

"Quirrell's actions do not preclude Professor Snape's." Not that Hermione truly believed Professor Snape meant Harriet harm, but a healthy dose of wariness would serve them all well—and honestly, what was the Potions Master _thinking_ , helping Harriet find a way past Professor Slytherin's _protego_? It was idiotic. Did he mean to have her murdered? _Expelled?_ Because Hermione thought both options a possibility when dealing with their inimical Head of House.

"He warned me against doing this, you know," Harriet said. "I think he called me a fool, and then said something about being ready for the consequences."

"Why _are_ you doing this?" Hermione had asked before, naturally, and she received the same answer now as she had then.

"I just have to."

Hermione didn't understand. Trouble invariably found Harriet with startling frequency, but it was unlike the bespectacled witch to cause her own problems, and Hermione couldn't wrap her head around her reasoning. She didn't _have_ to do anything; indeed, it seemed more imperative she do _nothing_ , and should this risky plan work—which, Hermione wasn't convinced it would—Harriet would more than likely regret her actions. Purposefully seeking a way in which to strike a professor, even in a scenario where such a thing became plausible, would get her in so much _trouble_.

 _I just have to._

 _Why_ , Hermione wanted to demand, but she didn't, knowing how her temper rose when presented with a vexing problem. No answer was forthcoming, either because Harriet didn't want to explain, or couldn't. Perhaps, instead of Hermione simply _not_ understanding, she _couldn't_ understand; in contrast to Harriet, Hermione grew up well-loved and sheltered, hungry for knowledge but otherwise fed, safe, comfortable. If she'd been raised as Harriet had, questioning when her next meal would come, terrified her beast of a relative might turn around one day and make good on their violent threats, Hermione might want to prove she could best someone like Professor Slytherin too, if only to know she _could_. There was a powerful sense of security in knowing someone you found threatening could be—theoretically—defeated.

Lost in thought, nibbling her lip, Hermione almost missed when the door eased open, assisted by magic and a strong, sudden breeze. The students dressed in green and silver entered first—though Elara snagged Harriet's sleeve and held her back, whispering low and furious, saying something Hermione couldn't hear. Whatever she said, Harriet shook her off and marched into the classroom, shoulders rigid and head held high, taking her accustomed seat near the front. Hermione and Elara followed her, sharing apprehensive looks.

Professor Slytherin stood before his lectern, dressed in his ever-present robes of black with the fine, emerald lining hemming the inside. He waited, silent, wand in hand, for the final Gryffindor straggler to make it past the threshold, then he brandished his hand, slamming the door shut in their wake. The sudden, hard _bang!_ stifled what little conversation had endured the transition from the hall to the classroom.

"Good afternoon, students."

"Good afternoon, Professor Slytherin."

He smiled, a bleak, ominous bearing of straight, white teeth. "Take out your essays on the etymology of the Conjunctivitis Curse. I will be Summoning them to me."

Papers crinkled and bodies shifted as Slytherins and Gryffindors alike shuffled through their bags to find their rolled-up essays. Professor Slytherin waited thirty seconds at the most before snapping his fingers, sending twenty or so scrolls sailing toward his desk at the far corner of the room. They settled in a tidy pyramid. "Now," the wizard said as he drifted from behind his lectern, robes rippling, the torchlight glinting on the shined silver buttons of his waistcoat. "We will be continuing with our practical studies, today examining the proper form and usage of the curse I had you write your essays on. If you did your research, performing the curse should be a simple task." A few students mumbled under their breath, uneasy, and Slytherin smiled all the more. "Let's see. How about…Longbottom. Yes, Mr. Longbottom, you're first. To the mark."

The Boy Who Lived made his way to the lion mark, and as he began what had become a standard ritual with the Defense professor, Hermione turned ever so slightly in her chair, looking at Harriet. The green-eyed girl glanced in her direction, and then away, watching Professor Slytherin and Longbottom, so Hermione looked to Elara instead. The Black witch didn't look away, but she always held her face so stiffly, Hermione couldn't tell what she was thinking.

 _Oh, I hope Harriet changed her mind_ , Hermione moaned in her own head. She prayed the reality of being in the classroom in front of the Defense Master had swayed Harriet from her path, and yet Hermione acknowledged the futility in such thinking. Harriet was not one to frighten easily. _She carries around one of the world's deadliest magical serpents under her shirt, for Pete's sake._

Parkinson followed Longbottom, then Bullstrode, Finnigan, and Goyle. Hermione's turn came before Harriet's, and her concentration suffered to such an extent she could only make a half-hearted attempt at the curse, earning herself a snide comment from the professor and a few low snickers out of the Gryffindors. Elara went, putting forth a better—if no less disinterested—effort. Slytherin wiled his way through the accrued bodies, until finally—.

"Miss Potter," Professor Slytherin called, grinning again. "Our last participant today. To the mark."

Harriet stood, straightening her skirt. If she hadn't been looking for it, Hermione would have missed how the other witch's hands shook.

 _This a bad idea. A very bad, very, very, bad idea—._

The short walk to the green marker seemed to take an age, when in reality, Harriet found her place a few short seconds later and turned to face Professor Slytherin, her wand already drawn. Oh, but how she looked so small standing there, half her hair escaping the quick plait Elara had finished for her that morning, cardigan a size too big, robes slightly askew—and yet, Hermione couldn't deny a certain _fluidity_ to her movements, an instinctual grace no one else in the class could quite mimic. Harriet just seemed to know where to put her feet on instinct, bending her knees, raising her arms. Hermione always felt awkward when she took the mark; if Harriet did, she gave no indication.

Without warning, the short witch took a breath and lunged forward, shouting, " _Oculi irritare!_ "

A quick burst of mustard yellow light flew toward Professor Slytherin, who waited with his shield already raised. Hermione noted how his wand hand twitched inside his sleeve, and she _knew_ he'd wordlessly adjusted his spell again, strengthening it against Harriet's oddly powerful attacks. Indeed, the Conjunctivitis Curse struck his shield, immediately slinging itself back at the witch, and Hermione held her breath, waiting for it to hit Harriet, when—.

Harriet _dodged_.

In the split second of time between the spell hitting Slytherin's _protego_ and firing back at her, Harriet dipped below the curse, eyes bright, lit up in the ugly glow, and her arm darted forward, wand out—.

" _Locomotor Mortis!_ "

The purple curse burst forth, the angle low, losing momentum against the platform, until it caught the stones properly, rocketing upward just as it dipped beneath the defined edge of Slytherin's transparent shield.

The wizard's legs snapped together, and in that instant, as he swayed, Hermione saw sheer, incredulous _disbelief_ in the wizard's red eyes.

And then, fury overcame him.

The Leg-Locker Curse didn't even last a full second before Professor Slytherin broke it, stepping forward, _into_ his next spell, and the whole of the classroom held its breath in shocked terror. The wizard's arm whipped down—not toward Harriet, as Hermione had expected, but rather to the side, the familiar light of a _flipendo_ skidding right, spiraling, catching the stones just as Harriet's curse had so it could sail around the hasty shield the bespectacled witch had thrown up, striking her right in the side. The force of the spell threw Harriet off her feet and into Lavender Brown's desk.

"Harriet!" Hermione screamed, unable to help herself. _How did he do that?! Is she okay?! Harriet tried that spell half a dozen times, but she couldn't get it to ricochet; how could he do it?!_

"Sssilence!" Professor Slytherin hissed. It wasn't necessary; the whole of the classroom had descended into a deadly, terrible hush broken only by Harriet's short, quiet panting. She was quick to rise, mumbling a quiet apology to Lavender as the stunned Gryffindor picked her glasses off the floor and handed them over. "I do believe we are using the _Conjunctivitis Curse_ today, Potter. Not the _Leg-Locker Curse_."

Professor Slytherin's voice hit Hermione's ear like oil, cold and slick and moments away from being ignited into a fiery cataclysm. The professor had his arms at his sides, pale hands clenching and unclenching in tight, furious fists.

"Well, _girl_?"

All eyes waited on Harriet as she swallowed, head down, eyes on the floor. "Sorry, Professor," she lied. "I didn't mean to. It was an accident."

"An _accident_ —." The wizard took a silent step closer and Hermione stiffened. "An _accident._ Ah, yes…how very…unfortunate. _An accident._ Thirty points from Slytherin."

To their credit, none of Harriet's housemates batted an eye. Neither did the Gryffindors.

"Allow me to make one thing very clear to you all; I will not tolerate another…accident in my classroom. I am gracious in allowing you children to practice your craft upon a superior wizard such as myself, but I will _not_ submit to being your practice dummy. You puling little—." He stopped himself, taking a breath. He ran a hand through his hair, straightening the mussed curl that fell across his furrowed brow. Hermione had never seen him come so close to losing his temper; the professor's constant, falsely genuine mask cracked enough to show a truly alarming visage behind it. "Do I make myself clear?"

Everyone nodded.

" _Do I?_ "

"Yes, Professor Slytherin!"

Harriet said nothing. She looked like she was having difficulty breathing, one hand folded over her neck, the other arm wrapped about her ribs. Professor Slytherin flicked his wand at the classroom door, and it crashed open again, two of the torches going out in the draft. Smoke tinged the air. "Class dismissed."

The students hesitated, caught unprepared, but they moved a moment later, rushing to gather their things and get out of the room. Elara snatched up Harriet's things, seeing as the shorter girl had been the first one out the door, Professor Slytherin's gaze never leaving her until Harriet vanished into the corridor. Hermione and Elara rushed after her, and they needed only descend the stairs to the first floor, finding Harriet slumped alone on the steps, out of breath and sweating profusely.

"Are you all right?" Hermione asked as she knelt, worried. "He didn't break your ribs, did he?!"

"No," Harriet wheezed. "It's—. My neck."

 _Her neck?_

Slowly, Elara set down their satchels and reached out, tugging Harriet's collar to the one side. The old curse scar was livid, skin raised, red, the white veins as stark as real lightning against her flesh.

 _That doesn't make any sense. Did the scar have some sort of reaction with the Knockback Jinx? It hasn't before, but then, Slytherin wasn't the one casting it then. It was Harriet herself, the spells coming off his barriers._

Groaning, Harriet lifted the edge of her shirt, displaying just enough of her side to reveal the fresh bruises already forming. They looked painful, but not serious. "Merlin," she grunted, jerking the fabric back into place. Her breathing leveled out as the pain faded in her eyes, color leaching from the raw, angry tissue about the curse scar. They could hear the rest of their class descending the stairs now, so they rose, Hermione keeping a hand on Harriet's elbow, making sure she didn't stumble. "Consequences be damned. He's such an _arsehole_."

"Honestly, Harriet."

Elara started to laugh.


	65. serpent charmer

**_lxv. serpent charmer_**

Cold morning air cut into Harriet's lungs and she savored the burn, holding it in, until she let it go with a hard, shuddering exhale.

Her sneakers hit the ground under her with steady thumps, the earth unyielding, chilled, compacted by a thousand years of a thousand feet following the same trail along the edge of the Black Lake. Cliffs overshadow part of the path, the natural divots and shelves bearing evidence of forgotten parties thrown by the upper years, initials and hearts carved deep into the rocks. Ahead, the Forbidden Forest crawled up from the shore, and the path loped away from the water into the trees, skirting the deeper woods, passing the far Gagwilde Tower on its final curve to the North Gate.

Harriet paused below the cliffs to study the hundreds of names left behind from previous generations. The low waves lapped at the sand, and the sound echoed here, sparse sunlight reflecting upward from the water, casting incongruous lines on the rocks. Behind her, Harriet could hear Hermione and Elara trying to keep pace.

"You wouldn't have to do anything else," Elara told Hermione, words choppy and breathless. "You would only have to mix the potion. I've already gathered the dew, the moth, and will have the leaf soon."

"You need more than that," Hermione retorted, flipping her frizzy hair. "What about a place to store it, hmm? What if someone tampers with it? Or it gets disturbed? It's very finicky, according to the books."

"I've a safe box with a Stabilizing Charm on it prepared."

"Did you get that out of your precious journal too?"

"Yes, actually."

"What are you two arguing about?" Harriet asked as the pair drew level with her, and both immediately slowed their speed, red in the face, breath escaping in sharp bursts. All three witches wore shorts, high socks, and their school sweaters, though Hermione had managed to smuggle in a Muggle track jacket with a zipper somehow. They'd only been jogging for ten minutes or so, and already felt winded at best and outright exhausted at worst.

"Elara—." Hermione began, balancing one fist on her hip. "Wants me to make her an Animagus Potion."

"Animagus? Like Professor McGonagall?"

"Yes, exactly like Professor McGonagall."

Harriet wrinkled her nose in thought, knocking sediment from her sneakers. They weren't due to cover Animagi for quite some time, but Harriet had skimmed ahead, thinking it'd be awesome to change into an animal—until she read how devilishly difficult the whole process was. "Isn't that illegal?"

" _Technically_ ," Elara managed before Hermione could, scowling at the bushy-haired witch. "Just as that Horned Serpent you keep under your bed is _technically_ illegal, too."

"I was just asking, Merlin. Leave Livi be."

"It isn't illegal to try," Elara continued, some of the tension leaving her brow. "There is nothing written in the school bylaws or Ministry edicts that prohibits trying; only success."

Harriet snorted. "Seriously?"

"Yes. I've checked."

"Just because it isn't _illegal_ doesn't mean you should do it," Hermione insisted, both hands on her hips now, a lecture looming like a storm cloud in the distance. "Amateur Animagi transformations are incredibly dangerous—especially given your age!"

"At Uagadou, they learn when they're fourteen or so. A year is not a large difference, and there's no guarantee I could even attempt a transformation until next year, anyway."

"It doesn't matter! In 1962, Gail Patt attempted the transformation for her Transfiguration N.E.W.T extracurricular project and wound up getting stuck as a canary! A canary! They couldn't ever change her back, because she lost her humanity! The conversion between human and animal psyche is temperamental!"

"Will you lower your voice?" Elara snapped. "I understand it's dangerous, Hermione. I'm not a fool. For every failure, there's a story of success. It's something I wish—need—to do, no matter your feelings on the subject."

"You don't _need_ to do it—just as Harriet didn't _need_ to curse Professor Slytherin!"

Harriet winced. A week had passed since their disastrous practical assessment, and their Head of House still glowered at Harriet whenever he saw her. They hadn't had another practical—no one had, in any year, and Draco had been quick to blame Harriet for their increased theoretical course load, bringing down the scathing attention of the upper years on her head. Two sixth years almost tripped her down the stairs the evening prior.

"Don't drag me into this."

"I'm just asking you to make the potion," Elara said. "Not to attempt it with me."

"Well, I won't." Hermione stuck her nose in the air and crossed her arms, turning to the water. Elara let out a harangued sigh, and suddenly rounded on Harriet.

"Harriet will make it, then."

"Wh—? Hold on—."

"If Hermione won't, you will, won't you?" Elara arched a brow, the corner of her mouth twitching upward.

"Wait—I don't—I don't know anything about the potion—."

"Oh, that shouldn't matter," Elara said, and Harriet saw how Hermione's shoulders stiffened. "After all, the efficacy of the potion isn't important _at all_."

An incredulous grunt left Hermione, and she whirled around. "I do _not_ appreciate being blackmailed, Elara Black!" she snapped. "You know very well the potion's quality directly affects the success rate of proper transformation!"

Elara's widened her eyes, expression falsely innocent. " _Does_ it, now?"

"Have you given any thought to what might happen if _I_ messed up in making the potion? What would happen then?"

"You won't," Elara asserted, her answering smile softer, more genuine. It punctured Hermione's rising frustration, and her posture loosened. "And for the record, I believe Harriet could brew it as well—but, she's not familiar with the potion like you are, and if _I_ brewed it, it'd be an absolute nightmare."

Sour, Hermione picked up her feet and started on the path again, urging them to follow along. "I'll think about it. That's _all_ I'm promising."

"Thank you."

They walked for the remaining stretch by the shore, and when the steps led into the forest's skinny saplings, Harriet took the lead again, leaning into a slow jog. Flint and Boyle passed them at a considerably faster clip, both nodding their heads at Harriet, ignoring the other witches, and they saw Hufflepuff's Seeker, Cedric Diggory, as well. He was far friendlier, and actually matched their pace for a few minutes, chatting about Quidditch and classes and the Giant Squid, whose conspicuous presence loomed on the Lake's surface at their backs. He left soon after, though not without telling Harriet he looked forward to playing against her in their first match.

Thinking about having actually play Quidditch made Harriet queasy, and she pushed herself to run faster, Hermione and Elara chasing after her. What if she failed? What if she fell off her broom? Or froze in the air? She'd be the laughing stock of the entire school.

They hadn't even reached Gagwilde Tower, the school's farthest outpost, when the three witches stumbled to a halt, Harriet holding on tight to her side.

"Harr—Harriet, are you okay?" Hermione panted, bent over, hands on her knees. "Oh, I—I know I said exercising with you would be a good idea, but I forgot—forgot how _exhausting_ it is—."

"My bloody ribs still hurt," Harriet complained, trying to rub the pain out of the offending injury. She knew nothing had been broken—since, thanks to Dudley, she was intimately familiar with the feeling of broken ribs—but the healing bruises ached, showing the outline of where her body had struck Lavender's desk. Honestly, Harriet had been convinced the wizard had killed her for a second after his spell landed. She'd never encounter a _flipendo_ that powerful before.

 _Is that how he got it to bounce? s_ he wondered. _How did he manage to circle my shield? I didn't know that was possible._

"I told—told you to go to Madam Pomfrey."

"Madam Pomfrey reports all injuries to our Head of House."

"You're being ridiculous."

"Am I? Professor Slytherin would probably chuck me off the Astronomy Tower if he found out I went tellin' tales."

Elara suddenly sat in the grass, one hand to her chest, head down between her knees.

"Elara? You alright?"

The taller girl waved them both off with a hoarse, "Give me a moment," but when that moment passed and Elara continued to gasp for air, Harriet touched her shoulder. "I can't—can't catch my breath." Her face had gone deathly pale, almost blue, and her hand ran from her chest to her throat as if trying to coax the air back into her lungs.

"I think we should get her back to the castle," Harriet said. She grasped Elara's arm, and when the other witch didn't jerk away, she levered the arm around her shoulders and pulled. Harriet almost wound up in the dirt too, and would have fallen if Hermione hadn't hurried to catch Elara's other arm. Between the two of them, they got their friend upright, and set off as fast as they could across the grounds.

Running pell-mell on the dew-streaked grass proved more difficult than traversing the worn path, and by the time they came in sight of the castle's entrance, all three witches could hardly breathe, and Harriet felt as if a lead weight hung from her shoulder, yanking hard on the limb. Blood pounded in her bruises, and she wanted nothing more than to lay on the cold earth and pass out.

Sweating and wheezing, Harriet and Hermione managed to drag Elara—growing bluer than before—through the doors into the entrance hall. Given the early hour, no one was out and about to witness their graceless staggering, and Harriet couldn't decide if that was a good thing or not. They still had half the castle left to traverse to reach the infirmary.

"What in the blazes are you three doing?"

Harriet jumped, and from the lower dungeon corridor came Professor Snape, slinking up from the depths like a foul-tempered bottom dweller, skin sallow and eyes ringed in black as if he hadn't gotten a second of sleep last night. He brought with him the smell of bitter herbs and brine—which only reaffirmed the ghoulish imagery in Harriet's head.

"It's not even an hour past dawn, and you're already up to no good, Potter?"

"It's Elara, Professor," Hermione said before Harriet could argue. "I think she's having an asthma attack."

The wizard lost his sneer and his eyes snapped to the witch in question, taking in her stark complexion and short, wheezing breaths. He stepped nearer, and his black wand appeared from his sleeve, Snape levering it at Elara's throat as she looked at him with wide, panicked eyes. " _Anapneo_."

Elara wheezed and coughed, but she did manage to breathe somewhat easier than before, the pained, pinched expression on her face smoothing.

Snape's wand disappeared back into his sleeve. "Bring her along. Quickly now."

"But, Professor—."

"Quickly and _silently_ , Granger."

Elara leaned on them for support, and they descended into the subterranean dungeons, chasing Snape's black cloak cutting through the sputtering torchlight. He led them straight to his office, a place Harriet had had the misfortune of visiting once or twice for detention, though Snape usually conducted those in the classroom. He waved a hand to dismiss the wards and opened the door, leaving the three witches to follow after him into the cluttered space, pointing at the stiff, worn chair set before his desk. "Put her there."

They dropped Elara into the seat, and Harriet rubbed her sore shoulder with a groan of relief. The smell clinging to Snape thickened here, emanating from a little iron cauldron set on a narrow counter between an overburdened shelf and a rickety cabinet. She hadn't a clue what he'd been brewing. The professor himself stopped before a large portrait showing a turbaned man and two cobras, the painted wizard playing a low, winding tune on a carved flute— "A _pungi_ ," Hermione supplied in undertone, seeing where Harriet's eye had wandered. Snape touched the portrait's frame and it swung inward, revealing a second room larger than the office itself.

"Those must be his private stores," Hermione muttered, watching as Snape dismissed another ward and opened a thick-paned cabinet door, revealing several shelves stocked with all manner of potions. "I can only imagine what he has tucked away in there. Look, those are Hungarian Horntail scales! Those are highly regulated. And there—that's a jar of Banshee screams."

"Banshee screams? Isn't that just—air?"

"Don't be silly, Harriet."

Harriet didn't think it a silly question, but she nonetheless shrugged and let Hermione continue peeking inside Snape's storeroom while the man's back was turned. She let her attention drift instead to the portrait door, hanging not quite open and not quite closed, the charmer taking a break from his music to lounge on a reed mat. The snakes hovered at the edge of their basket, tongues flickering. One cobra turned to the other and hissed.

" _The dark one isss having visitorsss, he isss_."

" _Hatchlingsss, they are._ "

" _What doesss he want with them, we wondersss?_ "

The second, more cohesive cobra bobbed its head, peering at them. " _The Mudblood and the mad one and the whissspering hatchling, yesss._ "

Harriet stiffened.

" _What isss they doing here, we wondersss?_ "

" _The Massster will want to know, he will._ "

" _Yesss, yesss._ "

Snape shouldered his way into the office again, and the snakes quickly dipped into their basket, out of sight. ' _Master_ ,' the one had said. Harriet knew enough about snakes to understand the way they addressed people; their species shared a keenness for adjectives, the "loud one" and the "fat one" and the "dark one" common enough in their speech, while they referred to Parselmouths as "Speakers." Harriet had never heard the term "Mistress" until she chose to step past the Dursleys' threshold and follow Set into the unknown. She couldn't be certain, but she believed the difference in address came with allegiance—and she was damn sure the only Speaker in the castle who could be called _"Master_ " was Professor Slytherin.

Professor Slytherin had snakes watching Snape.

The Potions Master tipped Elara's head back and all but dumped the contents of a slim, slightly orange vial down the witch's throat. Sputtering, Elara shoved his hand away and retched.

"Hold your breath, Black. Do not vomit in my office."

Harriet frowned as Elara did as told, pressing a trembling hand to her mouth. "You could have warned her."

Snape narrowed his eyes.

"Err. Sir."

A tense moment passed them by, and finally Elara began to breathe without difficulty, her first inhalations raspy and stilted, but soon smooth and quiet, the blue color fading from her lips. Snape asked her questions in his bored, tired drawl—did her chest feel tight, did she feel the urge to cough, had her lungs cleared—and as Elara answered, Harriet thought about the portrait. Did Snape know about the snakes? She could admit he was bloody clever, but even clever people overlooked obvious things. Snape walked about in a part of the castle filled with snake totems and memorabilia; Harriet thought it plausible he might not realize just what he had hanging on his wall.

"You're fine," Snape grunted, banishing the empty vial back into his storeroom, slamming the portrait closed with a swish of his wand. "You do realize the track is out of bounds for first and second years, do you not? Don't lie to me, I know exactly where you were, girl. Did you dunderheads never think to consider this situation is precisely _why_ you are not allowed out on the grounds before decent human beings have rolled out of their beds?"

He continued on in that vein for some time, and Harriet tuned the professor out, deciding he was exaggerating—or lying outright. She'd seen other Quidditch players out running, after all, and nothing in the rulebook said she couldn't go out simply because she was younger.

"Potter, are you _listening?_ "

"Yes, sir," she replied, blinking. Snape did not look convinced, but the man had obviously had little sleep and couldn't be arsed with her attitude this morning.

"Black, do refrain from doing anything too strenuous in the future, lest you choke and expire." His tone implied he wouldn't be terribly upset if that happened, and Elara scowled, the haughty lines of her face sharpened with derision. "Get out, all of you. Breakfast is soon, and I mean to enjoy what's left of my morning before you pester me again."

Hermione hurried from the room, followed by Elara, who shot Snape one final withering glance the Potions Master ignored in favor of staring Harriet down, who lingered overlong by his desk, fidgeting with her sleeves.

"What is it now, Potter?"

She almost left, hating how he'd taunted Elara even as he assisted the witch, but Harriet's ribs kept throbbing, a stern reminder of Professor Slytherin's hateful, mocking teachings, and so she squared her shoulders and remained. "Sir? Can I have a bit of parchment? And a quill?"

"…why?"

"To write down those notes you wanted. From class, you know."

Snape and Harriet stared at one another, the former suspicious, the latter keeping her back to the storeroom, a fierce expression holding her young face. If he scoffed and tossed her out, then Harriet would go, and would keep what she knew to herself—but Snape didn't scoff. He held her gaze, searching for something, and though he looked wary, the Potions Master wordlessly slid a sheet of parchment and a tatty, prepped quill toward her.

It all seemed so very dramatic to Harriet, this cloak and dagger game, and she was certain any other professor would've demanded she drop the pretense and be frank, but Snape didn't. Harriet leaned forward and scribbled out a line on the page.

"Thanks for helping Elara, sir."

"Out, Potter."

She went, and after the door swung softly shut, Harriet didn't see how Snape took the parchment in hand and read the untidy line. She didn't see him hold the parchment over an open candle and watch the words burn.

 _The serpent charmer has watchful friends, professor._

* * *

 **A/N: Some random factoids! According to Rowling, the bit about Uagadou students becoming Animagi at fourteen is canon. Elara's birthday is January 17th, making her roughly seven months older than Harriet, and about three months younger than Hermione.**

 **Harriet: "I have to run for Quidditch."**

 **Hermione: "We should all do it!"**

 **Elara: *literally dies***


	66. the door opens

**_lxvi. the door opens_**

September gave way to October just as it did every year: slowly, reluctantly, and then all at once. The last vestiges of summer released their earthly hold and the Hogwarts populace bid farewell to warm, sunny days spent idle on the castle's lawns. Iron-clad clouds became commonplace outside their windows, and Harriet often bemoaned the shift in weather as the clouds thickened and October skipped by. It was going to be a long, cold winter.

Their classes were more difficult than they'd been the year before, the professors already keen to prepare them for their third year, when their magical study would become "serious," new electives added to their schedules, nascent plans for future careers and exploits formed. Professor Slytherin resumed their practical lessons, though he didn't stop fixing Harriet with a gimlet eye each time he saw her, as if the bespectacled witch were a particularly vexing issue he hadn't yet decided how to handle. Some days, he stopped her in the corridors and asked how her studies were progressing. Other days, he heckled and belittled her, finding excuses to dock points or assign grueling detentions with Filch.

Harriet wished he'd make up his mind.

She exchanged several letters with Mr. Flamel, who she learned harbored a fierce passion for magical theory in all its shapes and forms, and thoroughly enjoyed expounding on his thoughts and ideas, so long as he had an attentive, interested audience. Harriet wrote to others as well: Madam Vance, Tonks and her mum, and even Narcissa Malfoy, the latter of whom reprimanded Harriet to improve her penmanship and to get along with Draco. Tonks wrote about her day to day at the Aurory, and Harriet always looked forward to reading her funny anecdotes.

On Hallowe'en, a day Harriet—unlike the majority of students—dreaded, she woke to find a different kind of letter left on her nightstand.

Yawning, Harriet searched the blankets for her glasses—poking and prodding at Livi to shift him about—and picked the letter up, peeling back the familiar, sticky wax seal.

 _Dearest Harriet,_

 _It has been brought to my attention that I—and, by extension, your relatives—have been negligent in considering your welfare on this inauspicious anniversary. Again, I must beg your forgiveness for an old man's wandering mind, and ask you to allow me to make up for your aunt and uncle's remiss behavior. I have requested your professors allow you to skip your morning classes, and should you desire it, I will be available at nine o'clock in my office to take you to visit your parents._

 _Yours in sincerity,_

 _Albus Dumbledore._

 _\- P.S., I enjoy Tangy Toffee._

Harriet stared at the short missive after she finished reading it, gaze distant, looking at something she couldn't rightly see. Her stomach twisted, and she felt—strange. _Visit your parents._ It was a nice euphemism, considering her parents had died eleven years ago today, interred in the earth sixth feet under and yet inexorably out of reach. Harriet didn't know if she wanted to see their graves, if she wanted to ignore the whole holiday, or if she wanted to just stay in bed and forget she was an orphan raised in a cupboard without a real guardian to talk to.

"What's that?"

Elara stood at the side of Harriet's bed inside the curtains, though for how long, Harriet couldn't say. Livi nosed the other girl's dressing gown, searching for treats, and without missing a beat, Elara reached into Harriet's nightstand and withdrew a Snake Snack, carefully handing it over to the excited serpent so he'd leave her be. Harriet watched this transaction without thought, giving Elara the letter. She read it, then sighed.

"Are you going to go?" she asked, and Harriet shrugged one shoulder, unsure of what to say. Elara tucked a hunk of Harriet's wild hair behind her ear, and the younger witch looked up at her friend. "You should go with Professor Dumbledore. I think it'll be good for you to have something…concrete, tangible. Something you can actually remember about them, even if it's not really the memory you want to have."

"Maybe you're right."

And so, when Harriet dressed for the day, she forewent her school uniform and dressed in the trousers, sweater, and casual robes she usually saved for the weekend, though she did throw her Slytherin scarf around her neck. She skipped breakfast, and when the hour approached nine, she left the near-silent dorms and walked to the Headmaster's office, listening to her own footsteps echo in the empty halls.

She gave the password, Tangy Toffee, to the gargoyle, and climbed the spiraling stairs, ignoring the tight, nervous sensation gripping her middle when she knocked and stepped inside the waiting office. The door to the closet where Quirrell almost murdered her was firmly closed.

"Harriet, my girl. You're right on time."

Professor Dumbledore sat behind his desk with an open book on its surface, a heavy, flat bauble kept on the page to mark his place. He smiled, though the gesture lacked its usual brightness, and even his attire appeared less luminous, Professor Dumbledore dressed in darker, Gryffindor crimson robes with a gray cape that looped over his right side, hiding his lack of an arm. "Ready to leave?"

"Yes, sir," Harriet said, uneasy. She didn't wish to be ungrateful—after all, how many other people got half the day off and a personal escort by the Headmaster?—but she couldn't quite blunt the frazzled edge of her unsettled mood. If Dumbledore noticed, he chose not to say anything. He gestured for her to come closer, then stuck his hand into his pocket to retrieve an empty lemon sherbet wrapper. Harriet glanced at it, then at the Headmaster, brow quirked.

"It's a Portkey. Have you traveled by Portkey before, Harriet?"

"No, sir."

"Oh, it's easy enough to do. Just hold on to that edge there—tightly, make sure not to let go. Usually, the wards won't allow the use of Portkeys within the grounds, but I've tweaked them just for this morning." He chuckled. "Now, Portkeys are often set to timers, but I've given this one a password. Are you certain you're ready? Do you have a firm grip?"

Harriet pinched her side of the wrapper harder. "Yes, Professor."

"Good! Here we go, then." Dumbledore cleared his throat. " _Ariana_."

In an instant, it felt as if Harriet had swallowed a large fish hook, and it tugged sharply behind her navel, throwing her forward, but not into the desk. There was a great, flashing whirl of color and pressure, her head gone light and woozy, and Harriet didn't think she could've let go of the wrapper even if she wanted to. Her hand simply froze upon the paper—until her feet hit something solid, knees buckling, and only Professor Dumbledore's hand tight upon her elbow kept Harriet from sprawling on the ground.

"Here we are," he said, and Harriet straightened with a gasp, pushing her hair back from her eyes.

They stood in a quiet lane bordered by tidy cottages and thick, old-growth trees, the sun overhead blocked by dense holly branches. It was a quaint village; Harriet spotted a post office and a corner shop across the square where a stone church and a graveyard lay in quiet repose. The church's bells chimed the hour—nine, deep-bellied gongs—and the sound echoed, chased by the wind and the occasional distant voice. Not far beyond the church, the country sprawled wild and stark in the morning's crisp, unremitting light.

"Where are we, professor?" Harriet asked.

"Godric's Hollow. Though technically a Muggle establishment, wizards and witches have been settling en masse in the area for a thousand years." He retrieved his wand, shortening Harriet's robes into a coat, changing his own attire into a suit with a checkered tie. "That said, it's best we blend in, my dear."

A strange frisson went through the young witch as she studied the village she knew her family had lived and died in eleven years ago. She'd avoided the place on her English tour that summer, though before her travels came to an abrupt end outside Bantiaumyrddin, she'd considered visiting, just once. "…I didn't know they were buried here."

"It was James' wish. Though the Potters have a sizable plot at the Stinchcombe Estate, James and Lily grew to like Godric's Hollow very much. James stipulated in his will that, should the worst come to pass, he and your mother wished to be laid to rest here."

Harriet didn't know what to say to that, so she looked down at her shoes. Professor Dumbledore held out his hand, and Harriet took it, her fingers dwarfed by his long, wizened ones. "It's just over here."

She followed him to the graveyard, passing through the iron kissing gate into the rows and rows of rising tombstones. Cracks and moss marred some of the ancient plots, devouring old markers, time and the elements wearing away names, dates, and faces until nothing, not even a memory, remained. The magical headstones held up better than the Muggle ones, but they too suffered in the passage of years, Charms wearing thin, letting rust and decay nibble at the graves' edges.

Her parents had been interred beneath a shared marker neatly placed between the others, the spot inconspicuous but clean, the stone a bright, gleaming marble. Someone left a bundle of red spider lilies resting against the stone. Harriet could scarcely bring herself to read what had been engraved.

 _IN LOVING MEMORY_

 _of_

 _James Fleamont Potter | Lily Anne Potter_

 _27 March 1960 - 31 October 1981 | 30 January 1960 - 31 October 1981_

 _"The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death."_

"I—what does that mean?" Harriet asked, voice gone thin, strained. "I don't understand."

"It's a quote from Corinthians," Dumbledore softly answered. "Some interpret it to mean there is life after death, and others believe it means we should not fear our end, that death is but an enemy for us to conquer and accept, another part of life."

Harriet still didn't understand very well, but she understood very little at the moment, the world at once too big and too small, thoughts in disarray. "I don't know what I'm supposed to do."

"How so, my girl?"

"I don't—I don't know what I'm supposed to think. What I'm supposed to feel." Harriet swallowed. "I never knew them. I—it's silly, isn't it? To miss something that never was? I miss them so, so much sometimes, and I've so much to be thankful for—Elara giving me a place to stay, and everyone who helped watch over us this summer, but I…. They'll never be there. I'll never have that house I grew up in, with my mum and dad waiting for me to come back from school. They'll never send me a letter, never say they're proud of me or disappointed or—I'll never get to chat with my dad about Quidditch, and I'll never get to ask mum about girl stuff." Harriet let out a short, breathless laugh. "They're just a footnote in a wizarding history book now, and I just feel…so sad, Professor. Especially today. It's been _years_ ; I should be over it, shouldn't I? Am I weak for being so miserable?"

The Headmaster touched her shoulder, and Harriet kept her stinging eyes on the ground, tracing the lines of the spider lilies. Who left those here? She would most likely never know; her parents, after all, had lived entire lives before her, lives she could only learn about in half-remembered snippets and vague, side-comments given by strangers.

She didn't have flowers. She should have thought to bring some.

"You're allowed to grieve for what might have been, Harriet. Tears are not an evil thing; it is, perhaps, worse to deny them. Your mother's love saved you that night so very long ago, and it does not make you weak to mourn losing that love."

Harriet nodded and sniffled, swallowing again.

They stood side by side in silence for several minutes, each lost to their respective thoughts, Harriet's gaze on her family's graves, Dumbledore's eyes drawn somewhere else in the cemetery, to another plot and another marker Harriet couldn't see. He allowed the young girl another moment of introspection before emitting a low, thoughtful hum. "Your father was quite the prankster in school, you know."

Harriet looked up. "Was he?"

"Oh, yes, most definitely. He and his cohorts once managed to smuggle a whole quart of Nettle Itching Powder into my sock drawer."

"How on earth did he manage that?!"

"I believe he convinced one of the school's more impressionable house-elves to assist him." Dumbledore shook his head, beard twitching. "At the time, neither I—nor my poor feet—found their antics very funny. They received a whole week of detentions for that."

Harriet laughed.

"And your mother—." Dumbledore paused. "Your mother had a way of inspiring the best in people, not unlike yourself, my dear girl."

"I don't think I inspire anyone, Professor."

"I wouldn't be so sure about that." He retrieved his wand from his pocket again, then used a spell to conjure a bouquet of white carnations, levitating it over to Harriet so she could lay the magical flowers down next to the fresh lilies. Tucking his wand away, Dumbledore extended his hand, and Harriet took it once more in her own, allowing the elderly wizard to slowly urge her away.

"I once knew a boy who was, in many ways, similar to you, Harriet."

"How so?"

"He was an orphan who never got to know his parents. He was a brilliant wizard, just as you're a brilliant witch, a Slytherin—a lad of immense promise. Yet, for every similarity you share, there are innumerable differences. He was cruel, motivated by anger, bitterness. Where you feel grief and love, he felt only betrayal and hate."

They walked from the cemetery and passed the church, crossing under a tree's thick shadow. Harriet shivered.

"You're talking about…about _him_ , aren't you, Headmaster?"

"Yes."

"…are we really so similar?"

Professor Dumbledore shook his head and looked down at Harriet, his blue eyes dim in the brighter sunlight. "No, Harriet. I once told you Lord Voldemort is many, many things, a man of infinite evil, but he was once just a boy, as you are just a girl. The Dark has led many souls astray; grief and sadness can so often turn to anger and corrupt impressionable hearts. Your parents wouldn't have wanted that for you."

They passed by an empty lot where the grass grew high and swayed in the cold breeze. It was a lovely village; Harriet could see why her parents had grown so fond of it. She liked to imagine them living here; maybe they shopped at that corner market, or went to that pub, mingling with the Muggles. Maybe they sat on that bench there, below that maple's creaking eaves, arm in arm.

She knew the professor's words to be true; so often anger crept up on her, hot surges of prickling frustration directed at Longbottom for living, her parents for dying, at Voldemort, the Ministry, Dumbledore, the world. _Two hours_. All it took was two hours for a war to end, two hours between their deaths and Longbottom's supposed ascension—though, in the end, it hadn't been Longbottom at all. It had always been Lily, as if she'd simply been fated to die that night, regardless of her daughter's fate.

"Why did _he_ come, Professor? Why did he come for us?"

"That's a story for another day, I fear."

She squeezed his hand, and didn't question the wizard further. "I am angry sometimes," Harriet admitted, not meeting his eyes. "But I—I know I'm not alone. I'm angry they were taken from me, but I know I still have people like Elara and Hermione who love me, and that's what really matters, right?"

Professor Dumbledore smiled. "I couldn't have said it better myself."

"Thanks for bringing me today, sir."

"You're very welcome, dear girl."

 **x X x**

After returning to the castle, Harriet did not resume her classes. Rather, she spent the remainder of the day in her dorm with Livius and Kevin, the former pleased to have her attention, the latter too scatterbrained to notice a difference. She thought hard on what the Headmaster had told her, staring at the canopy of her bed, stroking Livi's smooth, warm coils. She tried to imagine the Dark Lord as Dumbledore had described him—a clever orphan boy in Slytherin—but she couldn't picture him as anything but that half-formed monstrosity stuck to the back of Quirrell's head.

 _You're clever too, aren't you, Harriet? A Slytherin, like me._

Harriet rolled onto her side, frowning.

 _I can give them back to you, silly girl. What Voldemort takes away, he can return…._

The oddest remembrances about that day always struck Harriet at off moments; she best recalled how the Mirror of Erised had shattered, green light lurid on the glass, Set's shadow swelling higher and higher as if he meant to consume Quirrell whole, the Ravenclaw alum crumpling into a dead, motionless heap. Harriet had been most terrified by the temptation she'd felt in that split second, thinking of her mother's hand in her hair, her father's crooked smile, the warmth of unequivocal, parental love.

 _I will let you share in that eternal life, Harriet…._

"No one lives forever," the bespectacled witch softly whispered. Not her parents, not her, and not Lord Voldemort.

Livi hissed in affirmation.

"Harriet?" A gentle knock landed on the door before it creaked open, Hermione sticking her head inside. "Harriet, are you all right? The feast is due to start soon, and you've not had a thing to eat all day."

"Yeah, I'm okay," Harriet replied, sitting up. "Lemme grab my robes and I'll be there in a tick."

"Okay." Hermione went to leave, then hesitated. "Elara…told me you went to see your parents' graves today."

"Mhm."

"Are you—? Well, if you want to talk about it…."

"I'm fine, Hermione." Harriet smiled, the gesture not as forced as it might have been had she not visited Godric's Hollow. Elara had been right; having something concrete of her parents, even something as grim as a plot in a graveyard in a village miles and miles away, helped. "Let's go to the feast, I'm starved."

They left the dorm together, finding Elara waiting in the common room, chatting with Daphne Greengrass. They picked up Bulstrode and Parkinson on their way to the Great Hall, the benches and tables already crowded despite dinner not being due to start for another ten minutes. Harriet and her friends found spots closer to the Head Table than she'd like, but they nonetheless sat, ready for the festivities to begin.

"Where have you been all day, Potter?" Malfoy spat as he shoved a first year out of the way and took the place on the other side of Hermione. The bushy-haired witch frowned, decidedly unpleased with this arrangement. "Must be so difficult, being the teacher's pet. Did you get told off at _all_ for playing sick?"

Elara scoffed. "You're just jealous no one likes you enough to keep _you_ as a pet, Malfoy."

The blond boy flushed. "Why are you always butting in, Black?"

"Apologies, you speak so loudly, I'm sure there's someone across the hall who doesn't think you're talking to them."

Harriet laughed, and so did Blaise Zabini, seated next to Draco, and the older Carrow twins, whom Harriet didn't know very well. Defeated for the moment, Draco settled on the bench, scowling at Zabini, who just shook his head and changed the subject.

The professors arrived, trickling inside alone or in pairs, some more enthused to be there than others. Snape paused long enough to tell off a couple of Hufflepuffs who got too rowdy, and Slytherin sauntered by his House's table, expression placid, his presence dimming the conversation until he moved off. The Headmaster had changed into a pair of eye-searing orange robes with moving bats on the hem, and Professor McGonagall had on a traditional witch's hat. Dumbledore announced the feast with little fanfare—a miracle, really—and the empty platters stretched across the tables filled with all manner of delectable treats and desserts.

"You'd think they'd make a passing effort to provide something healthy, wouldn't you?" Hermione sniffed, glaring at an iced tart that glared right back at her. "Tarts before dinner, honestly!"

"You sound like my grandmother, Granger," Pansy complained. "Why don't you go sit with the other old hags?"

"That's incredibly rude."

"So's eating with _your_ kind at the table—ouch!"

Harriet tossed a mild Stinging Jinx—a favorite of Mrs. Malfoy—under the table, feigning innocence, though Hermione wasn't fooled. Smirking, she pushed another tart onto Harriet's plate.

They dined on whatever took their fancy, and even Hermione—notorious for her dislike of sweets—found a suitable platter of savory pastries to suit her appetite. The Gryffindors devolved into a raucous mess not ten minutes into the meal, and Professor McGonagall had to leave her own meal to sort them out, the Ravenclaws debating hotly about the location of the school ghosts, the Slytherins keeping their own conversations under a respectable decibel. Accipto Lestrange, a fourth year, kept spiking people's drinks with some fancy, foreign Firewhisky, until Snape came swooping down from his seat and confiscated it all.

The first course ended and the second course began— " _More_ dessert?"—and Harriet let out a content sigh, rubbing at her tired eyes. Around her, many of the other students yawned and leaned against one another's shoulders, burning through what little energy the sugar gave, so she guessed they didn't have long before the Headmaster dismissed them for the night. At the Head Table, Professor Dumbledore fixed himself a cup of tea while lending an ear to Professor Flitwick, the shorter wizard standing on his seat to make himself heard. Professor Slytherin's brow was furrowed as he looked about the Great Hall, and Snape had already disappeared for the evening, as had a few of the other professors Harriet didn't know. Madam Pomfrey watched her charges eat their confections with a kind of grim acceptance. The sight made Harriet grin.

Given the volume in the hall and her own distraction, Harriet almost didn't hear the murderous whispering—but when she did, it was all she could pay attention to.

 _Time to kill…kill…kill…Blood…BLOOD…._

Her goblet fell with an unheard clatter, splashing pumpkin juice over a tray of pudding, a jack-o-lantern going out with a stifled hiss. "What the hell, Potter!" someone said, but Harriet didn't pay them any mind. She gulped, mouth terribly dry, her heart racing in her chest as she slowly turned her head, searching for the source of the voice, looking at the happy, sleepy faces surrounding her, finding nothing suspicious. No one else seemed to have heard what she did.

 _I didn't imagine it_ , Harriet thought. Once was a coincidence—but _twice_? Why did no one else hear it? Was someone having a laugh? Was she—was she going _mad?_ Did the voice exist as some kind of manifestation of her nightmares clawing its way out of her subconscious? What did the wizards do to people who heard bloody voices in their head? It was bad enough her shadow moved on its own—they'd lock her up and throw away the key if she started hearing things.

"Harriet?"

"I—I don't feel well," she said, which was true enough. Her stomach twisted with nerves and her gorge rose, the taste of bile on the back of her tongue, so Harriet stood and hurried from the hall, one hand on her wrist, clasped tight over the wand sheathed there. Someone was taking the mickey out of her—they had to be. Perhaps an older Slytherin, paid off by Malfoy, still sour over losing out on his Quidditch spot. They wanted her to think she'd cracked—.

 _It's bloody working!_

Trying to steady her racing pulse, Harriet forced herself to slow as she crossed the entrance hall, leaving the bright glow of the festivities behind her, squinting in the softer lighting of torches and dimmed braziers. The main doors had been shut tight for the night, the wind rising in the dark beyond the diamond-paned windows, buffeting the aged glass, howling where it managed to sneak through the cracks. Water dripped against stone—a measured, rhythmic splash—and Harriet looked about for the source—.

On the far wall, at the foot of the main stairs, words gleamed dull and red in the light, splattered across the surface in a liquid Harriet swore must be blood.

 _The Chamber of Secrets has been opened. Enemies of the heir, beware._

The blood dripped into a puddle at the base of the wall, and the rising wind screamed louder than the white noise echoing in Harriet's skull. There, by the words, something hung stiff and limp from a bent torch bracket, something brown, furred—.

 _That's Mrs. Norris. Filch's cat. Someone killed—._

Harriet's hands shook as she stared, speechless, confused—terrified. She didn't stand there a moment longer, didn't wait for someone to find her here. Harriet turned heel, and _ran._


	67. voices

**_lxvii. voices_**

It took Hermione and Elara longer to find her than Harriet had expected, but it was only a matter of time before they came rushing into the dormitory.

Elara needed only jerk aside the curtains to spot the bespectacled witch sitting cross-legged in the middle of her bed, pale and wide-eyed, and she nodded. "So you _did_ see it, then?"

"Of course I saw it!" Harriet hissed, eyes darting about the room to ensure they were alone. "I might wear glasses, but I'm not _blind_."

"Why didn't you come back to the hall?" Hermione asked. "What if someone noticed you were gone?"

"I couldn't have returned to the hall. I looked like I'd seen—." _A ghost_ , Harriet's mind supplied, but no, that was a Muggle euphemism, one that didn't make sense in the magical world. "—well, like I'd seen a dead cat hanging off the bloody wall! And I wasn't going to just stand there, like a loon."

"She's not dead," Hermione corrected, laying a comforting hand on Harriet's arm. "Professor Dumbledore said Mrs. Norris has been Petrified."

"Petrified? How?"

"He wasn't sure—."

"Or he just didn't say," Elara added, sitting at the foot of the bed.

"Or that, yes. But he did say she could be _un-Petrified_ , eventually."

 _Eventually?_ "Do they know who did it?"

"No—did you see anything?"

Harriet glanced at the door again. "…no."

Just then, a loud bang struck the wood, and all three girls flinched. "Professor Slytherin wants us all in the common room in five minutes!" Prefect Farley shouted before moving off to the next dorm. They heard her repeat the message to the first years, her voice dwindling into the distance, trailed by footsteps and muffled muttering.

Harriet exchanged uneasy looks with the others. "Is it just me," she asked. "Or is this suspiciously like last Hallowe'en?"

"If Snape starts threatening us with detention, it'll be exactly like last Hallowe'en." Elara stood and tugged on her cuffs. She seemed unflappable, but Harriet saw the twitch in her restless fingers. "Let's get this over with."

The three said little else and exited the dorm, filtering into the common room with the rest of the Slytherins, who stood below the silver lanterns furiously whispering with one another like a bed of snakes curled under a heat lamp. Apparently, Filch had a near-breakdown in the hall when he saw his cat, only coming to his senses when Dumbledore arrived and reassured the caretaker. Harriet had little fondness in her heart for the man— "the Squib" as many upper-year Slytherins referred to him—or for his despicable feline, but that didn't mean she thought he or his pet should be _attacked_.

Who would do something like this? And what did their message mean?

Professor Slytherin entered the common room with Snape at his back, the latter dark and looming, stripped of his robes and cravat as if he'd been caught preparing for bed, while Professor Slytherin floated on a slowly simmering tide of his own ire, cold in his fury, the same look in his eyes Harriet had seen a second before he hexed her into Lavender's desk.

Harriet drew back farther into the shadows, resting her shoulders on the cold stone wall.

"Here we are again, another year—another Samhain wasted, squandered by some puerile fool's absurdity. Again, I am forced to _waste my time_ ," Slytherin hissed, teeth clicking hard on the elongated syllables. He took another step into the room, and those Slytherins nearest their Defense instructor edged away, leaning deeper into their seats, heads lowered. "I am unclear of the reasoning behind this pathetic display, but if you are the perpetrator of this… _prank_ , you are going to want to listen _very_ closely." Slytherin's voice dropped and nobody dared breathe. "This ceases _now_. If I discover who you are, there are far worse consequences to fear than mere expulsion." He met the gazes of his watching students one by one, and for the second his eyes flicked to Harriet's, she felt…chilled, like she was pressing her face into thick, frozen slush, the feeling pricking against her cheeks, her eyes, along her chin, down her neck—.

It lasted for only a second, then Professor Slytherin moved on, uninterested, and Harriet blinked. _What was that?_

He gave a few more scathing, carelessly veiled threats before re-numerating the House rules with heavy emphasis on curfew, while Snape did a silent headcount, thumb tapping a fingertip until all students were accounted for. "Any Slytherin caught out after curfew will suffer the consequences— _unpleasant_ consequences. This will be your only warning."

He turned then and left the dorms, Snape following in his wake without uttering a single word. No one found their voice at first, sharing brief, furtive glances as if expecting the wizards to come back. Then, a seventh year—Sven Rustwing—broke the silence when he started to laugh.

"I never thought Slytherin would get so bent out of shape over a Squib's cat!"

Everyone started talking then, harsh laughs and squeaks of disbelief, outrage, amusement. It sounded like a flock of well-mannered, aristocratic birds flustered over their feathers to Harriet, but she ignored all this in favor of dragging both Hermione and Elara to their favored corner in the common room, the one farthest from the main hearth and its waiting, watchful serpent.

"What was that all about?" she asked, gesturing at the entrance. "And what's the—Chamber of Secrets?"

For once, Hermione didn't have an answer for Harriet, her mouth forming a tight-lipped moue as she scowled at the floor. "I'm sure I've read the name somewhere before, but I…. I know for _certain_ it's in _Hogwarts: A History_ , but I don't have my own copy— _."_

"Harriet does."

Hermione blinked, clearly surprised. "You do? Have you read it?"

Harriet didn't know if she should be insulted Hermione sounded so astonished. "Yes, most of it. Bit dry."

"A _bit dry?!_ But it's so _fascinating_ —!"

They hurried back into their dorm, Pansy, Daphne, and Katherine already inside, deep in their own speculations. Harriet strode up to her trunk and unlocked the top, bypassing the higher drawers in favor of the lower compartment she didn't have a chance to use very often. The trunk's innards were replaced with a rickety wood ladder leading down into a dark hole.

Neither Hermione nor Elara made a move to enter.

Sighing, Harriet took out her wand and muttered, " _Lumos_ ," holding it between her teeth as she threw one leg over the trunk's lip.

"What—what are you _doing_ , Potter?" Pansy—having glanced up to sneer when they entered—saw Harriet standing on the top rung of her ladder inside her trunk, and Harriet—mouth full—threw the other girl a rude hand gesture before continuing down.

"You're such a bloody _gremlin_ , Potter, seriously—and aren't Extension Charms _illegal_?"

"Not on family heirlooms," Elara breezily replied. "You'd know that if the Parkinsons had anything worth saving."

Whatever Pansy's remark was, Harriet didn't hear it, the witch's voice distorted once Harriet dropped the last few feet into the trunk's bottom. Her friends followed, and Elara shut the lid after, sealing them inside the stuffy, semi-darkness permeating the trunk's extra room.

Harriet spat out her wand. "Err, lemme find—."

She fumbled for the lantern sitting on the worktop, tapping her finger against the base to ignite the magical light. It was by no means a large space; the expanded room held little more than a half-dozen shelves above a chipped counter, a worktop varnished in aged patina, and an old cabinet with the Potter crest fashioned on the doors. Harriet kept the books she wasn't using often—like _Hogwarts: A History_ —on the shelves, making for a tidy, if modest, library.

"I didn't know you had this place," Elara said, glancing at the paneled walls stained by spots where frames once hung long before Harriet's birth. "Pansy can't lock us in here, can she?"

"No. It can't be locked with people inside." Harriet tugged a step out from under the worktop, using it to kneel on the counter and reach the higher shelf.

"Is that—is that a terrarium?" Hermione, puzzled, glanced over the glass tank where it sat on the floor by the cabinet.

"It's Livi's."

"Why is he always under your bed if he has a tank?"

"Because he's snooty, Hermione, and he doesn't like going in unless he has to. Here, help me with this…." Hermione lifted her arms to brace Harriet as she tugged the thick volume free and lowered it with a loud thud. "D'you remember where the bit about the Chamber would be?"

"I think so, yes. Oh, this is the _collector's_ edition! I heard it's has a whole extra chapter about—but never mind that right now. Bring the light closer, please? Yes, just like that…."

Hermione flipped through the sections, scrutinizing the title pages, muttering under her breath as her finger trailed down the paragraphs. Waiting, Harriet sat on the counter and kicked her feet, while Elara peered into the empty terrarium and at the little chipped teacup Kevin enjoyed napping in.

"Here it is: ' _the Chamber of Secrets is the most enigmatic of all tales concerning the establishing of Hogwarts. It is said to be the parting legacy of the founder, Salazar Slytherin, a powerful wizard famous for his dislike of Muggle-borns. Slytherin left the school after arguing with his fellow founders, and the legend of the Chamber arises in its eponymous secrecy, for Slytherin never shared its location with another. That hasn't stopped the student body from carrying on the Chamber's rumor for centuries, stating only Slytherin's alleged 'true heir' could open the Chamber and use what magic lies within to purge Hogwarts of its Muggle-born population. Exhaustive searches have never discovered such a place, and it is believed most likely fictional._ ' That's it?" Hermione glowered at the book as if it'd let her down. "But that doesn't give us any information!"

"It does explain why Draco shouted, ' _You're next, Mudbloods!_ ' before the Headmaster arrived. How does _he_ know about the Chamber?"

"That prat said _what—_?!"

"His father knows everything," Hermione said, flinching at the inadvertent compliment paid to Mr. Malfoy. "He's very _informed_ , I should say. This is exactly the kind of thing he'd make it his business to know."

"Malfoy's juvenile, but do you believe him capable of Petrifying Mrs. Norris?"

"No…Draco's a wretched little beast most of the time, but not—malicious enough, or clever enough, to come up with a plan like this. Besides, he was at the feast…."

As Hermione and Elara spoke, Harriet reread the passage—just a paragraph really, listed among other far-flung memories and urban legends, cursed vaults and hidden Ravenclaw libraries, a singing toilet and long-lost reliquaries. "That's why Slytherin is so angry, isn't it? It basically says Slytherin's heir would come and kill all the students with non-magical parents. _He's_ the Heir of Slytherin."

"Well, him or Minister Gaunt," Hermione corrected. "Neither have children and _both_ claim to be Slytherin's final living heir—and it's like Rustwing said, Professor Slytherin reacted rather…oddly, considering."

"Or not oddly at all."

"What do you mean, Elara?"

The taller witch crossed her arms and leaned a hip on the worktop. "Supposing the Chamber is rubbish, someone still attacked Filch's cat and said 'beware the Heir.' Everyone knows, or thinks, that's Professor Slytherin. It could possibly be someone trying to.…" She flipped a hand, searching for the right word. "Please him? Get his attention? He does earn a lot of fanatic regard from a few of the upperclassmen. Maybe they thought this would make him happy."

"You're right. Hmm…do you think it was an upperclassman, then? Maybe Rustwing. He was quick to express disbelief in Professor Slytherin's reaction…."

Harriet carefully closed _Hogwarts: A History_ and took it in her arms, holding the thick book to her chest. "I…." She had to tell them. No matter how mad they thought her, Harriet needed to tell her friends what had happened in the Great Hall. "I, um, heard something. At the Feast."

"What do you mean? Is that why you left so suddenly?"

"Yes." She ran her fingers along the book's edges, then sighed. "I heard a…voice." An inadequate summary, in Harriet's opinion; she couldn't describe how the words had crawled through her ears, how it felt like…like _madness_ , all that bloodlust and hatred and _need—_.

A furrow appeared between Hermione's brows. "Whose?"

"I don't know."

"Given we were sitting with over two hundred other people, what was different about this particular voice?" Her mouth popped open. "Oh! Were they talking about what was going to happen to Mr. Filch's cat?"

"Not exactly?" Harriet returned the hefty tome to its proper shelf, turning her back on the other witches, attempting to order her thoughts. The lantern flickered, and she thought she saw Set moving on the wall behind Elara, but her friends didn't notice. "They…they said it's 'time to kill' and something about 'blood.' They didn't mention Mrs. Norris." She faced the others again, not missing their disturbed expressions. "Did either of you hear _anything_?"

Mute, Elara and Hermione shook their heads. Having expected as much, Harriet shut her eyes.

"Harriet…."

"I'm _not_ mad."

Hermione huffed. "I wasn't going to say you were," she snapped. "But it's been a very long day for you—for all of us. Is it possible you misheard? Or perhaps picked up on one of the others talking? Like Professor Slytherin pointed out, it _is_ Samhain, and some older students—like the Weasley twins—always use it as an excuse to scare the younger years."

Of course, it _was_ possible; Harriet had to acknowledge the feasibility of Hermione's suggestion because it _had_ been a long day and she _was_ rather exhausted. Anything was possible, and the more time that passed, the more intangible the words became, muddled and fuzzy, distant from that cramped trunk smelling of cinnamon and cloves. It seemed as if hours and hours had passed since Harriet sat eating supper.

"I didn't mishear," she said, decisive. "Because I heard it before, when I had detention with Snape."

"Professor Snape?"

"And no, before you ask, he didn't hear anything either. He was in the storeroom."

Hermione suddenly looked uncertain, biting her lower lip and fiddling with her hair. "…Professor Snape _did_ leave early this evening…."

"So?" Harriet frowned—and then considered Hermione's words, a breathless snort escaping her. "Come off it. You don't _really_ think Snape's—?"

"I don't know what to think, now do I?" Hermione interrupted, eyes bright. "You said yourself, you've encountered this voice twice—once while alone in his company, and then again when he serendipitously left the feast early. Whoever attacked Mrs. Norris _couldn't_ have been in the Great Hall, and they needed an understanding of Dark magic to Petrify her. Professor Snape is an ideal suspect."

Harriet scoffed again, ready to argue—when Elara shook her head. "No. Harriet's right."

"No? Elara, you hate Professor Snape more than either of us!"

"Hating the man has no bearing on his status as a suspect. After spending half a summer trapped in the same house as him, I can honestly say it's doubtful Snape would do something like this."

Seeing Harriet bob her head in agreement, Hermione demanded Elara explain what she meant.

"He thrives on solitude and quiet. On the days he was meant to mind us, he sequestered himself in the potions lab and we wouldn't see him until dinner time. It's the same reason he's always going after us to obey the rules; surly as he is, Snape just wants order."

Harriet nodded again. "He's a bit…high-strung for all this."

"Exactly," Elara said. "I wouldn't write Slytherin off, despite everything he said. I think it's a student, but Slytherin usually _enjoys_ games like this."

"It's not a game," Hermione replied. Her eyes fell to the floor, the lantern's light touching upon their glassy surface. "Especially not at the expense of Muggle-borns."

"I didn't mean it like that, Hermione."

"I know, I know."

With nothing left to say, the three witches climbed from the trunk, and were greeted by Pansy's ill-spirited taunts and Millicent's loud, unbothered snores. Harriet got ready for bed, and as she slid between her cool sheets, she tried to make sense of what she'd seen, and what she'd heard, wondering what would drive a person to paint that kind of madness on a wall. _The Chamber of Secrets has been opened. Enemies of the heir, beware._

Who did it? Why? And what was going to happen now?

Harriet had no answers to any of these questions. She buried her anxious, tired head in her pillows, and tried to get some sleep.


	68. history, legend

**_lxviii. history, legend_**

Rumors abounded in the week following Mrs. Norris' attack, and though it took a few days, everyone came to the same conclusion the House of Serpents had decided on Hallowe'en; Professor Slytherin was the only known Heir of Slytherin at Hogwarts, and thus the most likely candidate to have opened it.

The Defense professor was never pleasant; he came across more genial and welcoming than other Slytherin professors, like Snape or Selwyn, but his tone always carried venom, menace and retribution paid in equal measure with his compliments and advice. After Hallowe'en, Professor Slytherin's previous disposition became a fond, summery remembrance, replaced by a cold, suspicious attitude he didn't bother to hide from his students. Though Harriet didn't have Defense the following Monday, they heard complaints traded by the other Houses and years about Snape and Selwyn overseeing all of Slytherin's classes. The professor returned by Tuesday—and most everyone wished he'd stayed away longer.

On Wednesday, the second year Slytherins dragged their weary bodies out of bed and tromped off to Defense first thing in the morning, only to be assigned a lengthy essay and told to get started during class. Professor Slytherin sat at his desk for the duration of the lesson, engrossed in a thick, dusty scroll, turning all questions back upon their askers with unsubtle disdain. He deducted points from anyone who spoke, and so they sat in stifling silence, quills scratching at their scrolls, Slytherin's red gaze sharp and punishing each and every time he looked up.

Attending their following Potions class with an overworked Snape proved just as—if not more—difficult.

"Partner with Granger, Black," Snape ordered before Elara had a chance to get out her potions kit. "I haven't the time nor the patience to scrape your mess off the ceiling today."

The Gryffindors snickered.

"Ten points for disrupting class, Longbottom."

The snickering died out in an instant. "Seriously?"

"Ten more points."

No one was inclined to say much of anything in class after that, and Harriet kept her attention on her cauldron, lest she wind up in yet another detention. Elara and Hermione traded off tasks, Elara keeping her hands away from the potion or the ingredients themselves, attempting to look busy while Hermione did most of the work herself. Dean Thomas splashed Shrinking Solution on himself when class was nearly over, resulting in a very strange, pudgy baby arm flapping about in his sleeve and an irate Snape. The Slytherins escaped the dungeons while the Potions Master berated Dean and his friends.

"Foul bat," Elara muttered as they walked toward the Great Hall for lunch. "McGonagall is going to be furious about him taking all those points from Gryffindor."

"She'll make up for it in Transfiguration tomorrow, just you wait. 'Breathing, Mr. Longbottom? Excellent technique. Forty points for Gryffindor." Elara snorted and though Hermione tutted, Harriet caught the small smile tipping the edge of her mouth. "Last night at Quidditch practice last night, Flint and the others commented that all the essays they got back for Defense had Snape's handwriting on them—his handwriting, and apparently a lot of scathing remarks."

Hermione gaped in horror. "Professor Slytherin wouldn't pass off his duties as a teacher!"

"It would explain Snape's mood today," Elara said, ignoring Hermione's indignation. "I couldn't imagine the terror of having Snape in Defense as well."

Harriet's thoughts flashed to an early evening in the Potions classroom, remembering Snape standing at the board, writing out numbers and theories while Harriet rushed to copy every word. "You know," she said. "I don't think Snape would be a terrible Defense professor."

"All the more reason to discredit Professor Slytherin," Hermione murmured as they came upon the entrance hall. Longbottom and his cronies came rushing by, keen to put as much space between themselves and the dungeons. "He's a Potions Master with distinctions in all five branches, but he _also_ received a distinction in Charms—Defense, specifically, _and_ he initially applied to Hogwarts as a Defense instructor before taking the post for Potions."

"Hermione, I know you've told us a dozen times you've looked up the professors' qualifications, but how on _earth_ do you know that?"

"Well, that last bit might just be gossip from the older students—but it makes an awful lot of sense!"

Harriet and Elara ribbed Hermione over her less than stellar sources all throughout lunch, until Hermione was quite cross with both of them and chose to sit with Sally-Anne Perks in Charms instead of at their table. Harriet kept levitating little apology notes over to her desk, and Hermione turned all of them to ashes, much to Elara's amusement and Sally-Anne's anxiety. They eventually grew bored with their game and turned their minds to their studies, listening to Professor Flitwick lecture on the etymology of the spells ' _Rennervate_ ' and ' _Enervate,_ ' and why you should never ever mix up the two.

Hermione joined with them again on the way to History of Magic, readjusting the strap on her bag. "Did you finish your essay, Harriet?"

"Yeah. Why?"

"You've been busy with training in the morning and practice at night. You need to have enough time for your homework."

"I finished it in Slytherin's class."

"What! You could get in so much trouble for that!"

"It wasn't as if he was paying attention to us anyway, for Merlin's sake…."

They stopped in the corridor outside the dusty chamber used for History of Magic, standing with several Hufflepuffs from their year who gathered together, murmuring, tossing furtive looks in their direction. _What's their issue—oh._

Despite all the rumors and Professor Slytherin's strange behavior, the Chamber of Secrets business had been pushed to the back of Harriet's mind, displaced in favor of Quidditch practice, training in the morning, and keeping on task with her studies. She kept listening for the ghoulish voice, but she heard nothing suspicious over the last few days. Professor Sprout was waiting for her Mandrakes to mature, and Professor Dumbledore assured everyone Filch's cat would be good as new when the plants grew and Snape made the Mandrake Restorative Draught. She'd almost forgotten the negative attitudes the rest of the school had taken toward Slytherin students.

The chamber door swung open. "Get in, find your seats," Professor Selwyn said from the threshold, one hand still on the door, eyes narrowed behind his spectacles. "Entwhistle, you had best not be bringing _food_ into my classroom, boy…."

The three Slytherin witches found seats in the back, letting the Hufflepuffs fill the middle while the rest of their year took up the front. It was the only class Hermione didn't insist on grabbing a spot closest to the board, but neither Elara or Harriet questioned her about it, especially after Hallowe'en last year. Harriet didn't much like History of Magic; Professor Selwyn took what could be a fascinating subject and made it tedious, snarking about Muggles and Muggle-borns, interspersing rants about the superiority of magic that had nothing to do with magic and everything to do with his own fat head. He hated Hermione and Harriet for their Muggle blood, and hated Elara for being from the "Most Ancient" House of Black, a title he fully believed belonged to House Selwyn.

It was all pointless to Harriet and her friends, who sat in the back and did their best to learn something.

The rest of the students dribbled inside, and the door closed with a muted thump, Professor Selwyn ordering them to pass their essays up to the front for him to collect. "Now," he said, snatching the final scroll from Runcorn's desk, transferring them in an awkward shuffle to his own larger desk. "Today, we'll be turning our attention from the Battle in the Black Forest to the International Warlock Convention of 1289, which arose as a direct result of the Battle's outcome—."

Professor Selwyn came to a sudden halt when someone raised their hand. "What is it, Macmillan?"

Harriet didn't know Ernie Macmillan well. She didn't know much about _any_ of the Hufflepuffs truly, given how they liked to keep to themselves, sharing nothing but polite greetings and the occasional bits of chatter with the other Houses. She knew from Hermione that the Macmillans were pure-bloods, their House fairly prestigious, and Elara told her once she was distantly related to the family. Harriet's limited interactions with Ernie led her to believe he was rather pompous, for a Hufflepuff, posh, and apparently Gryffindor enough to interrupt Professor Selwyn mid-lesson.

"Sorry, Professor, but given what happened just last week, could you tell us more about the Chamber of Secrets?"

Everyone stared at Ernie, including Professor Selwyn. Wayne Hopkins' mouth opened with an audible _pop!_ And Oliver Rivers knocked his inkwell off his desk, splattering Pansy's bag—not that she noticed. "We're here to discuss the _history_ of magic, Mr. Macmillan. Not the ' _fantasy_.'"

"I know, sir—but I read about the Chamber in _Hogwarts: A History_ , so doesn't that make it history?"

Harriet had the sudden and inexplicable urge to laugh, one of those inappropriate giggles that rise up in one's chest at the worst, most tense moments. Professor Selwyn was more nasty than intimidating, really, but the silence following Ernie's question hung in the air, prickly and unpleasant, stretching on. Had Hermione asked a question like that, Harriet knew Professor Selwyn would've scoffed and mocked her for it—but not Ernie, a pure-blood from a good family. Professor Selwyn sniffed, lifted his nose, and began to speak.

"I'm sure you've all read the entry in Bagshot's book by now, though much of that tripe can little be called _history_ so much as an old woman's gathered gossip. The Chamber of Secrets is reputed to be a clandestine area of the castle created and hidden by the greatest of the school's founders, Salazar Slytherin." He sniffed again, pushing his spectacles higher on his nose. "The legend states that Slytherin, before leaving Hogwarts, encapsulated a means of purging the school of the _unworthy_ —." His eyes snapped toward Hermione, a small smirk on his lips, and Harriet bristled. "And that his supposed heir would one day return to the school and unleash this purging magic upon us."

"So is there any truth to it, Professor?" Ernie asked as scared murmurs rustled through the Hufflepuffs. Draco turned in his seat as if he meant to say something snide, but one glimpse of Harriet and Elara's foreboding glowers had the prat straightening around again. " _Is_ there a Chamber? Does it exist? Has it been opened?"

"You children need to learn the difference between fantasy and reality." The professor turned to the board. "Now, as I was saying—."

"But, sir—!"

"Three points from Hufflepuff, Macmillan," Selwyn snapped, growing frustrated. "Now, if you don't wish to learn, I don't care, but I _will_ be completing this lecture, even I must hold you all through dinner." Threat given, he retrieved his wand, and with a muttered incantation, the words ' _Warlock Conventions_ ' sprawled across the blackboard. Harriet thought that would be the end of the conversation, but Professor Selwyn turned to them all with a mocking smirk and said, "It's pointless to speculate if the Chamber has been opened again. If you're so interested in the topic, why not go ask Professor Slytherin? I'm sure he'd love to have a _long_ chat about the Chamber and his ancestor with any of you."

Of course, no one in their right mind would do any such thing, and so the subject dropped and Selwyn began his winding monologue on a bunch of oddly named wizards who lived hundreds of years before any of them were born. As she started to take notes, Harriet felt something scratch her elbow, and she glanced down to see Hermione prodding her with a bit of parchment. Puzzled, Harriet took it—mindful of the professor—and unfolded the note.

 _He knows more than he's letting on._

Harriet flattened the note and grabbed her quill, scratching out a reply. _What do you mean?_

 _Exactly what I wrote! He knows more than he's telling us!_

 _How d'you figure that?_

 _Because he recited what's written in Hogwarts: A History, but refused to give more information! By telling us to go to Slytherin, he's essentially warning us away from the topic!_ She punctuated her lines with heavy ink splatters that smeared on Harriet's fingers. _He said 'again.' Again! As if the Chamber's been opened before!_

 _Even if he did know more, it's not like he'd ever tell us._ Hermione scowled at Harriet's answer and shoved the parchment back without writing anything. Harriet sighed. _Being a professor, though, he and the others must've discussed the Chamber after what happened to Mrs. Norris, and if anyone knows anything, it'd be Dumbledore._

 _Or Professor Slytherin._

 _Slytherin wouldn't tell anyone anything. He won't even teach us how to duel._

Hermione read Harriet's reply—and Professor Selwyn's head jerked in their direction, eyes narrowed. "Passing notes, Potter? I'll take that—."

He Summoned the parchment out of Hermione's grip and it went sailing overhead—only to burst into flames, students gasping, the page burning to nothing just like all the notes Harriet had floated to Hermione during Charms earlier that very day. A muddled pile of ash and charred bits landed on the floor before Professor Selwyn, and he looked at Hermione, who sat with her wand extended, face pale but set in a determined expression. Selwyn scowled.

"You're earned yourself a detention tomorrow evening, Granger. With Filch."

"Yes, Professor Selwyn."

Harriet and Elara stared at their friend with shared incredulous expressions as Professor Selwyn Vanished the mess on the floor and Hermione raised a brow, refusing to meet the eyes of anyone looking at her. "What was that about?" Elara asked in an undertone, and Harriet shook her head, returning to her notes once Professor Selwyn resumed his lecture.

Hermione had a point; the professor had said _again_ , implying that the Chamber—legendary or not—had been opened _before_. When? Why? And by whom?

As the evening grew dark beyond the classroom's windows, Harriet kept her eyes on her half-written notes and wondered what new dangers lurked at Hogwarts this year, and what it meant for her and her friends.


	69. blackbird

**_lxix. blackbird_**

The excitement ebbed and flowed around him, eddying higher and higher like the morning sun and the brisk November wind. All Severus could think about was his bed, a dram of Dreamless Sleep, and the allure of a Saturday lie-in.

He'd liked Quidditch well enough as a boy and still enjoyed betting on the sport with Minerva, if only to raise the cat's hackles, but the veneer had long since worn for Severus, leaving him tired and irritable as he climbed the steps into the staffing section, wishing he could cast something to deaden the sound about the space, but he assumed the rest of the professors would take exception to that. He slid into a seat on the far row and leaned back, out of the sun, letting his eyes slide shut.

Perhaps a minute later, the smell of Earl Grey filled his nose.

Severus cracked open his eyes to spy a thermos of tea hovering before him. Minerva, having come up the stairs as well, stood with her wand in hand, smirking.

"I prefer Breakfast blend in the morning," Severus grumbled as he folded his fingers about the thermos and it stopped floating, weight settling in his hand.

"Good thing it's not all for you, then, Severus."

The Potions Master conjured himself a cup and poured hot tea into it regardless of his preferred flavor, sending the thermos back to McGonagall. "Have you come to watch your precious Gryffindors lose?"

"If you mean _win_ , then yes, of course." She perched on the edge of the bench next to him, tugging her tartan cloak tighter about her shoulder. "Och, it's cold in the shade. It's a wonder you don't freeze to death."

"One can only hope. Go sit in the sun if it bothers you."

"I will, once Jordan graces us with his presence," Minerva replied, a weary sigh leaving her lips.

"He's by far the worst commentator you've ever allowed up here."

"Oh, I don't think so. Do you remember the game Black commentated in your school days?" She let out a sound that was still incredulous all these years later. "Now _that_ was the worst commentary I've ever heard."

Severus' fingers tightened on the cup, and in a single motion, he downed the remnants of his scalding tea and grimaced. He dismissed the cup without taking out his wand. "No, I don't remember. I was in the hospital wing that weekend." Having a particularly stubborn pair of antlers—courtesy of the Marauders—removed. Perhaps it was for the best, as it did spare him having to listen to whatever inane shite Sirius Black's had said.

"Have you seen your new Seeker play yet, Severus?"

"No."

Minerva pursed her lips, eyes moving across the pitch to the far side of the stadium, all decked in silver and green. "For my Gryffindors' sakes, I hope she doesn't have James' talent."

The muscles in his jaw jumped as Severus grit his teeth, reminded now of two of his least favorite people, and it was not yet noon. "A troll taped to a broom would have more talent than _James Potter_ ever did."

Minerva went to argue, a flush of anger in her cheeks, but Jordan finally arrived, and the bitter cat moved on—treading on Severus' feet as she went, much to his displeasure. He was cleaning the scuffs off his boots when he caught a glimpse of something pale in his peripheral vision, and forced himself to swallow a groan.

"Severus," Lucius greeted, hair riled in the breeze, spilling like threads of platinum over his cheek and brow. That the wizard managed to look stately even at this Merlin-forsaken hour irritated Severus to no end, but his face remained placid, genial—or what passed for genial with the Potions Master.

"Lucius," he replied. "I must admit, I didn't think to see you here this morning."

The Malfoy patriarch simpered, taking the seat Minerva had vacated, flicking imaginary lint from his robes before resting his walking stick across his knees. The snake head glinted in the sunlight. "I simply had to come and see the girl who usurped my son's position on the team for myself. If her performance is lackluster, I do trust you'll see the _benefit_ in having her replaced?"

"I can make the recommendation." Not that it came down to Severus' decision in the end. He had no say over Quidditch placements and could only recommend a player for removal if their marks in Potions proved poor. Even if Potter proved a piss-poor player, Slytherin would probably let her stay on the team just to spite Lucius.

"Usually I would leave such a childish dispute to _children_ , but Draco's letters have been incessant, and I can little stand his complaining. Narcissa has told the boy arguing with a witch is unseemly, but he…."

Severus turned a deaf ear to Lucius, wondering what fate decided to curse him with the man's presence today. Most of the seats in the lower stands had been filled, students keen and eager for the first game of the season to begin. Severus watched the pitch, catching movement at the gates as the teams were allowed out, and the volume in the stadium increased to something near riotous. The other Houses snickered, laughed, pointed; Potter was an incongruous addition to the hulking Slytherin team, her head barely reaching Bole's shoulder, who happened to be the shortest brute in the bunch. Even at the distance, the girl radiated nerves, face pale, and Flint bent to her ear, muttering something that did nothing to change her hunted expression.

"Lucius, what a surprise."

Slytherin stood at the end of the row, a smile plastered on his young, winsome face, Selwyn standing sullen at his elbow. Wordless, Severus rose and offered Slytherin his seat, but the wizard waved him off and sat on his other side, pushing Selwyn on to sit by Lucius. Malfoy stiffened, his drawling monologue interrupted, and inclined his regal head.

"Good afternoon…Professor."

From the corner of his eye, Severus saw Slytherin's lip curl. "How _are_ things at the Ministry? I assume Minister Gaunt has been keeping you busy."

Lucius' fingers clasped his cane and released, the only outward sign of his distress aside from the lines about his eyes and the stiffness of his spine. "Naturally. The Ministry and the Minster are always busy working for the betterment of our society."

"You needn't feed me the party line, Malfoy. You know better than that."

Lucius swallowed. "Yes, of course, my—of course."

Inwardly sighing, Severus diverted his attention from the meaningless posturing happening around him. Hooch stood in the middle of the pitch now, bringing the two team captains together. As usual, Flint and Wood did their best to break one another's fingers while their teams looked on, prolonging the moment until a sharp look from Hooch broke them apart. The teams mounted their brooms, and Severus narrowed his eyes at Potter, waiting to see what she would do. If the jeering reached her ears, the girl gave no sign; she stared straight ahead, goggles in place, grip tight, face grim but determined.

 _Bull-headed,_ Severus thought. _Should have been a bloody Gryffindor._

The whistle blew, the players kicked off—and the girl soared, quick and furious like spellfire in the sky, going higher and faster and farther than any of the others as the game began and the Snitch disappeared with a spark of gold. Spinnet—Gryffindor's Seeker—made to follow, but Potter was already gone, hurtling skyward—and then down again, breaking through the players, a divisive tactic even Severus recognized meant to split apart the Chasers. She flew reckless and hard—not graceful, not like a hawk on the prowl, but rather a scavenger, a black-feathered crow spiraling and swooping, pestering, her eyes kept keen for the sparkle that would end the game in their favor.

"Here we are, first Quidditch game of the season, both Houses ready to give it their all! For Slytherin, we have Flint, Pucey, Montague, Bletchley, Derrick, Bole, and Potter! For Gryffindor; Weasley, Weasley, Wood, Johnson, Bell, Spinnet, and—of course—Longbottom!" The part of the stands draped in crimson and gold hollered their approval. "The Slytherin team this year is riding the new Nimbus Two Thousand and One; marvelous broom, bit of an unfair advantage in my opinion, but what can you expect from their team—?"

"Jordan."

"All right, Professor, all right. Gryffindor in possession already with Longbottom leading the charge—beautiful shot there with a Bludger from Fred Weasley—or George, I can never—anyway, Longbottom has the Quaffle, now Johnson. Watch out, Angelina—excellent evasion! That girl can fly! Longbottom, Johnson, and Bell in formation, Longbottom in possession again. Bletchley doesn't have a hope of blocking this—."

It happened fast. Unseen from above, Potter dove, swift and unrelenting, shouting something at Longbottom, because he looked up and swerved out of her way—right into Flint. Potter was a small girl with the build of a Bowtruckle, but Flint had the stocky solidity of a troll, and Longbottom collided into him with an audible thud, almost as if he'd hit a brick wall. Unruffled, Flint snatched the Quaffle from Longbottom's stunned fingers and bolted in the opposite direction.

"Ooh, nasty tricked played there by Slytherin's new Seeker, second year Harriet Potter. Bad luck, Neville…."

Slytherin guffawed, watching the girl far more closely than Severus thought necessary. _Fuck, I should have never helped her fight him._ "My, I didn't think little Potter had it in her to fight dirty. Always full of surprises, that one. It seems your boy won't be playing Quidditch this year, Lucius."

Malfoy said nothing.

Severus laid his hand on his opposing wrist, his thumb idly running over the space between the edge of his hidden wand holster and the protruding bone, his eyes still following the game. The Vow had been silent for weeks, suffering only the occasional prickling or numbness. Severus found it curious, considering Quidditch was dangerous, no matter how one looked at it. The Vow reacted to intent and primal understanding; it didn't care about rules or Charms on brooms or watching professors. Severus himself tensed whenever the girl threw herself forward or dropped recklessly; the danger was controlled but indisputably there, and yet the Vow did nothing.

As Severus contemplated the issue, he theorized it had a direct connection to the girl's conception of danger, rather than his own. After all, when Quirrell grabbed Potter last term, Severus' wrist hadn't started to burn until she apparently woke in front of the Mirror of Erised. The magic of the Vow had been perplexing wizards and witches for centuries, and Severus doubted he'd live long enough to ever truly grasp its full implications.

"Hmm…it appears the Boy Who Lived is having difficulties."

Indeed, Longbottom had broken formation and flew in erratic circles about the pitch, trying to shake off a persistent Bludger. The Bludger chased the boy, and though the Weasley twins whacked it away several times, the ball flitted away from other prospective targets and came shooting at Longbottom again.

Severus grunted. "It's been tampered with."

No sooner had he spoken, the whistle blew and Hooch grounded the players, the stands erupting in confused shouts and discontent booing. Minerva stood for her place by Jordan, and seeing as Slytherin wasn't about to make himself useful, Severus rose as well, stretching his sore back. "I guess will see what has occurred."

Left with Slytherin, Lucius paled. _Serves the git right._

He trailed the Head of Gryffindor down from the staffing section back onto the grounds and through the gates to the pitch itself. The wind lowed through the expanse and carried with it the shouting voices of the two teams, a mixture of green and red players taking advantage of Hooch's distraction to yell and throw accusations. Potter had enough sense to stand out of the way behind Montague; Wood grabbed hold of Flint's uniform, his face flushed, and the Weasley twins eyed Pucey as if contemplating how best to hit the thick-headed boy.

"—nothing by slimy, underhanded Slytherin cheaters—."

"—don't know what you're talking about, Wood—."

"—blatant tampering! It's bad enough you've taught your Seeker how to cheat, too—."

"—scared of short runt like Potter, are you? Pathetic—."

"Wood!" McGonagall interjected when the fool made to strike Flint. She hurried over, one hand braced on her hat, keeping it in place. "Mr. Wood, release him this instant, this is highly improper—."

Severus sneered. "Ten points from Gryffindor for _improper_ conduct, Wood." Minerva bristled.

"Professor Snape, I do think we can be lenient, considering—."

Moving on, Severus ignored the witch's annoyed glower and strode over to Hooch, the wind catching and throwing his hair into his eyes, cloak billowing. The referee had the rogue Bludger pinned to the grass with magic, containing it, though the ball did its damnedest to break her spell. It thrashed and rolled, tearing at the sod in its attempts to go after Longbottom.

"Oh, it's been tampered with, all right," Hooch said before Severus could speak. "Stunned it twice, and the blasted thing won't do as it's supposed to. The other one seems just fine."

Frowning, Severus flicked his wrist, wand sliding down into his hand. He spoke a basic counter-curse, and when nothing occurred, tried another. A third yielded similar results, and a fourth—meant for Dark spells—did nothing at all. "Where did you keep these, Hooch? Your office?"

"Aye. No students have been in there, not unless I've been there, too."

"This isn't a student's doing. None of the dunderheads at this school could overpower the Charms on a Bludger." _And_ , Severus supplied in his own head, _none of them could use something creative enough to thwart me_. Who, then? And why? If they meant to maim or kill the Idiot Who Lived, there were far simpler ways to go about it, and Severus doubted anyone with the skills capable of overriding the Bludger's magic would bother with rigging a bloody school Quidditch match. What a waste of time.

"Watch out!"

Hooch's spell wavered, and the Bludger rocketed from the ground, nearly taking Severus' head with it. " _Fuck—_."

"Severus—!"

He whirled about, wand raised, and snarled, " _Expulso_."

The Bludger exploded. The Gryffindors screamed as small bits pelted their heads. They turned wide, fearful eyes to their Potions Master with his wand still extended, and Severus grinned, the look only serving to terrify them further. _Bloody cowards._ He stuck it wand back in his sleeve. "Find a spare," he said, turning heel and marching off the field.

The game resumed soon enough. Hooch retrieved a new, acceptable Bludger from her locked office, and though the players took to the skies again without further mishap, Severus remained at the gate, standing in the tunnel's shadow with his shoulder leaning on the wall, listening to the intermittent groan of wood and formless cheering. Minerva stayed as well, hands together, knuckles white with controlled concern.

"You don't think it's like—last term?" she asked in an undertone, placing special emphasis on her words. Above, the students roared as Gryffindor managed to make a goal. "You don't think it's _him_ again?"

"Doubtful, but who are we to guess _his_ whims?" Severus muttered. Bitter, he clenched his teeth and thought of how easily that Bludger could have gone after a different student, how easily it could have broken the bones of a girl no bigger than a bird—. "Where is Albus?"

"At the Ministry. Gaunt has taken a special interest in recent events here at Hogwarts and has been calling Albus in to account more often than usual."

Silent, Severus thought about this—and about Cloyd Dogbane and a dead Death Eater on the floor of a tent, Slytherin hissing _"Sssomeone seeks to play us!_ " and probing Lucius for intelligence on Gaunt's movements. The strange game played between Gaunt and Slytherin was not new; for a decade, they delighted in undermining one another, and Albus had long theorized Gaunt would eventually make a more blatant move against the Defense instructor. Was this the Minister's doing? Was he interfering at Hogwarts?

The crowd screeched, howled, feet bouncing on the stands as the two Seekers dove, and Potter rose first, fist held high with a glimmer of gold sparkling between her thin fingers. Slytherin House cheered. From his place in the shadows, Severus hardly noticed.

* * *

 **A/N: As part of the Slytherin team, I totally believe Harriet would learn how to play dirty—especially since that seems to be their default play style.**


	70. madman muttering

**_lxx. madman muttering_**

For once in her life, Harriet enjoyed receiving attention.

After being poisoned last year, Harriet spent the latter part of the term subjected to rumors and curious, watchful gazes, most everyone wanting to know just what had happened, and who had wanted to off a little first-year Slytherin. The eyes following her now held none of that sharp pity; her housemates looked at her with triumph, with something akin to appreciation, and Harriet felt proud.

"I honestly can't believe you can fly that well," Hermione remarked as she sipped her Butterbeer, fresh from Hogsmeade, smuggled in by an older student who knew a secret way out of the castle. Around them, Slytherins celebrated their win over Gryffindor with less restraint than they usually exhibited, and every so often one of them would wander over to their table, clap a hand on Harriet's shoulder, and congratulate her. "It was unexpected."

"Gee," Harriet replied as she broke apart a Chocolate Frog. "Thanks, Hermione." Elara snickered.

"You know I don't mean it like that." Hermione scowled, and Harriet grinned, offering her a slightly melted leg. "No, thank you—those are so morbid, it's still kicking! Anyway, I thought there'd be a bigger learning curve in Quidditch. Obviously you're talented, but you flew just as well as any of the others, and they've been playing for years or were raised with brooms in their childhood."

"I don't know, I think it's easy."

"Easy for _you_."

"No! You're just too—tentative. The broom can tell you're nervous and it makes the broom nervous, too."

Hermione groaned and lowered her head into her arms. "It's Defense all over again."

"What d'you mean?"

Hermione straightened, blowing stray curls out of her face as she jabbed a finger in Harriet's direction. "She's a prodigy, and she doesn't even realize."

"It's not surprising," Elara agreed, savoring her tea.

"Hey!" Harriet protested. "It's not hard. You just—you take the broom, right? You, err, you sit on it and you—you just fly!" Hand motions accompanied her vague explanation, and Hermione's face turned pink with her effort not to laugh. "You sit, and—don't laugh, blimey. It's not hard, I promise!"

"It would have to be simple for _Potter_ to manage it."

Biting back a groan, Harriet turned in her seat and scowled at Malfoy, the lone Slytherin in the bunch not celebrating their win. He wore a sullen expression, even if he did have one of the Butterbeers in hand and had been pleased enough earlier to see the Gryffindor team in low spirits. He strode over alone, Goyle and Crabbe both off having a laugh with one of the older Slytherins.

"Go away, Malfoy."

"I have just as much right to be here as you, precious Potter."

"Then go over there and be fat-headed and entitled, not here."

"If it weren't for the brooms _my father_ bought the team, you'd be worthless," Draco snapped, cheeks flushed with anger. "As worthless as Longbottom!"

"Would not," Harriet retorted, unable to help herself. Arguing with Malfoy had little point, but she hated the prat's accusation. It fed on her own niggling self-doubt. Maybe it _was_ all the broom. Maybe she'd be rubbish on the slower brooms owned by the other teams—and what would happen if she didn't play as well the next game? Or the next? How quickly would her House's admiration turn to scorn?

Her stomach flipped in her middle, and she shoved her Butterbeer away.

"You're not special, Potter." Malfoy got in her face, and Harriet refused to back down, though she wished she was standing instead of sitting. Draco wasn't overly tall, but the difference in height itched at her nerves. "Just you wait until father buys me my own broom. Next year, you won't stand a chance."

"I'm gonna write to your mum and tell her you're being a berk again."

"She's _my_ mother, Potter, just because you're a rotten little orphan doesn't mean—."

Behind him, a seventh year most definitely _not_ drinking Butterbeer stumbled toward their table and tripped over a chair—or his own two feet. He crashed into Malfoy, throwing the second-year forward…right into Harriet.

 _Wham!_ Their heads collided, and she fell out of her chair with the pointy-faced bully sprawled on top of her.

"Harriet!" Hermione exclaimed as she and Elara jumped to their feet, the latter having to step over the older boy sprawled on the floor. Malfoy rolled off Harriet, dazed and disheveled, holding his sore head, and Hermione helped Harriet sit up. Her glasses clattered to the floor, split at the bridge.

"You broke my glasses!" Harriet exclaimed, reaching for the pieces. Her face burned, and when she touched her nose, it twinged beneath her fingers, red dripping against her lip. "And my nose! You broke my glasses and my nose!"

To his credit, Malfoy paled when he saw the blood on Harriet's hand, and his voice rose several octaves. "Wh—? Why didn't you move your stupid ugly face, Potter!"

"Your head's so fat with your ego, I couldn't dodge it!"

"Ah, shite," slurred the seventh year getting to his feet. Harriet couldn't recall his name, and she couldn't see him well enough at the moment to guess. "My fault, my fault. Here—lemme jush, lemme jush fix it _real_ quick like—."

"No!" Harriet squawked as the tall boy pulled out his wand and started waving it in her direction. She wasn't about to let him try magic on her!

"Oi, Abelard!" said one of the boy's friends, coming over to grab the boy's arm. "Let off the second-years! You've banged up our Seeker!"

"C'mon, idiot, you're pissed—," said another.

Harriet used her chair to help herself stand, sniffling against the blood trickling faster from her throbbing nose. Tears stung in the corner of her eyes, but she'd had worse from Dudley and wasn't about to cry. The other Slytherins offered to fix her up, but Harriet continued to shake her head. "I'm going to go to Madam Pomfrey."

Hermione nodded. "We'll come with—."

"No," Harriet protested, voice thick. "You heard what Slytherin said about curfew. I'll go and get a pass from the infirmary."

"If you're sure…."

Harriet couldn't say she _was_ sure, but she wasn't about to let one of the older, sloshed Slytherins have a go at healing her, and if she was quick, Slytherin himself would never have to know. She bundled her ruined sleeve up to her nose—lamenting the fact she'd have to owl Madam Malkin's and get a replacement—and headed off out of the common room. She was almost through the opening when she heard a sharp smack, followed by, "Ow! Bloody hell, Granger, I didn't _mean_ to do it—!"

The portal closed, sealing the drunken laughter and Malfoy's protests inside. Alone in the dungeons, Harriet picked up her feet and hurried forward with her head tipped back and her nose pinched closed, though she still felt the warm, sluggish trickle of blood moving along her cheeks and jaw. She crossed the entrance hall, footsteps echoing, chased by the soft crackling of torches dimmed for the night and snoring portraits. She could taste copper when she breathed in, her head woozy, face aching where Malfoy's thick skull whacked the bones. _Prat._

" _Kill…._ "

Harriet came to a sudden halt. Dread welled in her middle.

" _Filthy blood…kill…kill_ …."

"No," Harriet whispered, trembling, turning where she stood as the voice grew louder. Blood dripped from her sleeve and her chin, pattering on her shoes and floor. There was something terribly familiar about that heinous whispering—and she wasn't imagining it. She _wasn't._ Her bloodied fingers fumbled at the brace on her wrist until she grabbed her wand and held it out, heart thumping loud and incessant in her chest. There was nobody there. She stood in the middle of a long corridor, doors shut along its length, walls bare—and she _was alone_. "Show yourself!"

Her shout echoed into the distance. The voice disappeared with it, leaving the pale witch with nothing but her racing pulse and haggard breath. A minute passed.

Harriet didn't think she wanted whoever that voice belonged to come forward—not really. Images of Quirrell and his grotesque, deformed head popped up in her thoughts like scenes from a horror film, and Harriet would do anything to never see something like that again. She didn't know what to do. She was almost to the infirmary; returning to the dungeons would lead to questions about her un-healed face, and Harriet couldn't very well go running to a professor in the dead of night, talking about invisible voices in her head, covered in blood and half-blind without her glasses. They'd think she was a nutter!

 _Maybe I am a nutter._

Scared, Harriet continued on, wand still clasped in sticky fingers, running until she slipped inside the hospital wing proper and breathed a sigh of relief. She found a bit of luck when she knocked on Madam Pomfrey's office door and the medi-witch appeared, still awake, though she wore her long dressing gown and a distinctly weary expression. She glanced down at Harriet and jumped.

"Gracious Rowena—Miss _Potter!_ You scared me half to death, girl! What have you gotten yourself into now?"

Harriet realized her running about had done little to help her broken nose, and blood ran freely down her front. "I—tripped?"

The older witch obviously didn't believe her, but she simply tutted under her breath and ushered Harriet into the ward, helping her sit on the edge of the nearest bed. Madam Pomfrey raised the lights before turning to Harriet again. "All right, look this way, Miss Potter…yes, definitely broken. Now, hold still, lest you want a crooked nose. It'll hurt for just a second… _episkey!_ "

Harriet flinched, but otherwise didn't react as the medi-witch fixed her injury. Madam Pomfrey used her wand to siphon some of the blood from Harriet's skin, then paused, frowning at how peaky the young witch looked and the obvious swelling darkening her eyes. "Wait here a minute, Potter."

"Okay."

Madam Pomfrey bustled off to her office again, and Harriet sat tensely on the bed, listening, both hoping she would and _wouldn't_ hear that voice again. There had been something…familiar to the sound, something Harriet couldn't quite put her finger on, but had nonetheless recognized. It kept poking her in the back of the head, and if she could only wrestle down her panic for a moment, she knew she'd figure it out! Was their someone moving about the castle in an Invisibility Cloak like Harriet's? But why could only she hear them? Was it the same person who wrote those words on the wall and hurt Mrs. Norris?

The doors to the ward parted, edging open to admit Professor Dumbledore. Puzzled, Harriet froze and watched her headmaster shuffle into the ward backward, his reason for doing so becoming apparent when Professor McGonagall followed him, a student levitating in the air between them. The student held their hands stiff before themselves, their whole body immobile, and even at the distance, Harriet could just make out the blur of crimson and gold at their neck.

Looking up as she entered, Professor McGonagall caught sight of the Slytherin witch and sputtered. "Miss Potter! What are you doing here?!"

Harriet thought it obvious what she was doing there, but she didn't sass the professor, given the woman was now settling one of her own unmoving students onto a bed. "I—I tripped," she stuttered, staring at the boy. He was small, smaller even than Harriet. A first-year? "Or—well, some bloke named Abelard tripped, and—well, my nose got broke."

"Minerva," Professor Dumbledore interjected. "If you could retrieve Poppy and inform her of the situation, it'd be much appreciated."

Professor McGonagall did as he asked, and Harriet carefully placed her feet on the floor. She still felt lightheaded as she came to stand by Professor Dumbledore, and she had to blink black spots from her vision as she peered at the Gryffindor settled on the bed. The boy didn't move, didn't shift, didn't even appear to breathe. "Is he…Petrified, Professor?"

"I'm afraid so, Harriet."

The young witch swallowed, her heart once more striking an uncomfortable rhythm against her breastbone. _Petrified_. She'd heard the voice, and now a boy laid in the infirmary, stiff as stone. She should tell Professor Dumbledore, she knew, and as Harriet glanced up at the elderly man, her throat tightened. _I should tell him what I heard…but what if he doesn't believe me?_ she wondered. _It sounds barking, even to me. What kind of invisible, whispering madman could I hear that a wizard like Professor Dumbledore couldn't? What if—what if he thinks I'm a liar? What if he makes me go back to the Dursleys? What if…what if he thinks it's_ me?

"Harriet?"

"Y-yes?"

The Headmaster studied her for a moment, then asked, "Could you lend me your assistance, my girl?"

He gestured at the object the boy clutched to his face—a camera, Harriet realized when she bent closer and squinted. An old Muggle camera, probably one of the few bits of Muggle tech that would actually work inside a magical place like Hogwarts. Harriet edged her stained fingers between the camera and the boy's palms and shivered at the cold, clammy feel of his skin. She slowly edged the device from his frozen grip. "D'you think he got a picture of who did this to him, Professor?"

"That is my hope. Young Mr. Creevey is passionate about his photography, and it appears he chose the wrong night to indulge in sneaking out of his tower." Dumbledore gently laid the camera lens-down on the bed so he could use his one hand to free the cover on the film compartment. It clicked open—and smoke spilled from the crevice, Harriet grimacing against the smell of melted plastic as Professor McGonagall returned with Madam Pomfrey and gasped aloud.

"Oh, the poor dear," McGonagall whispered as she looked down at Creevey and touched the Petrified boy's forehead, smoothing his mousy fringe. "Albus, it could have been so much worse—."

Professor Dumbledore held up his hand. Harriet narrowed her eyes—and winced. _What does she mean by that?_

"Over here, Miss Potter," Madam Pomfrey ordered as she set down an open jar and a glass vial. Harriet went, rounding the bed to stand before the fussing matron. "It's too much. This can't be allowed to go on, Albus. It's attacking _students_ —."

"The Aurory, at the very least, needs to be notified—."

"The Aurory received my petition, as did the Minister. I can only wait for their response, as you well know." Dumbledore pointedly interrupted the witches again when they began to argue, and Madam Pomfrey went back to rubbing stinky bruise cream on Harriet's face. The young witch thought the wizard sounded…bitter, or as bitter as Professor Dumbledore ever could sound.

"Does this have to do with the Chamber, Professors?"

"Don't ask questions, Miss Potter. This is nothing for you to worry about." Madam Pomfrey uncorked the vial, the motion rushed. "That's a Blood Replenishing Potion. Merlin knows you've lost enough down the front of your shirt."

Harriet drank the potion—and though she wanted to kick a fuss at being ignored like a child, she didn't. Instead, she stored away the conversation so she could tell Hermione and Elara what she'd learned. Maybe Hermione was right. Maybe the professors _did_ know more than they were letting on.

"Back to the dormitories with you, Miss Potter," Professor McGonagall said, her tone brusque. She shared a final, lingering look with Professor Dumbledore, who nodded slightly. "Come along."

Harriet went. Despite the presence of a mature witch at her side, she grew anxious in the cold, poorly lit corridors, sticky with blood and chilled to the bone, shirt clinging to her collarbones. Professor McGonagall set a brisk pace, and they had almost reached the entrance hall when Harriet swore she heard the voice again and stopped dead, her mind whirling in a thousand directions, wondering if someone was going to appear from nowhere, if they'd attack, if Harriet and the professor would be nothing more than rocks like that Gryffindor boy—.

Pain prickled through her neck just as Professor Slytherin stepped around the corner.

He paused upon seeing them standing there, and when he recognized Harriet, the wizard's eyes hardened. "It appears Potter needs to be reminded of my curfew rule," he hissed as he strode forward. Harriet shivered.

"Miss Potter was in need of an escort to the infirmary," Professor McGonagall told him, her voice as cold as the look upon her face. _"She_ may be missing her glasses, but I assume _you_ can see the blood plainly enough, Professor Slytherin."

He sucked air through his teeth and didn't reply, flicking out the edge of his robes in dramatic fashion as he spun on his heels. "Very well. I've no time for this. Come, Potter."

Being ordered about like a misbehaving dog was growing old for Harriet, but she nonetheless fell into step behind Professor Slytherin, and the wizard rushed her back into the dungeons, all but shunting her into the common room without going inside himself. The party had wound down in her absence, fewer Slytherins milling about the shared space, and so Harriet continued on into her room, finding Elara and Hermione waiting for her there. Hermione handed over her repaired glasses, and Harriet was so exhausted from Quidditch and the after-party, she wrote herself a note to speak with her friends about what happened in the morning. They got ready for bed.

It was several hours later, long after the last of the smuggled Firewhisky had been drained, the silver lanterns doused, and sleepy Slytherins folded themselves into their blankets, that Harriet woke from muddled nightmares and sat upright, gasping, the warm coils of her Horned Serpent wrapped about her bare legs. She remembered. She knew why the voice was familiar, why she thought she heard it in the hall when Professor Slytherin appeared. She _knew._

"It's a _ruddy snake_!"


	71. skulduggery

**_lxxi. skulduggery_**

Midnight revelations, Harriet learned, rarely prove as crystal clear in the morning as they do in our dreams.

She told Hermione and Elara about the conversation shared between the professors in the infirmary, and she also informed them that the voice she heard was, as far as she could tell, a snake. They had difficulty proving her epiphany, however, because though Harriet swore to Merlin she heard a snake, they still had no idea how the blighted thing seemed to be invisible, and doubt grew in their uncertainty.

"Parseltongue doesn't sound different from English to me," Harriet explained as they huddled together in the library. Being a Sunday, there weren't many other students about, but Madam Pince still haunted the place and they didn't have an explanation for the kind of literature they'd accrued at their table, so the trio kept a low profile. Livi poked his nose out from her collar and Harriet gently prodded him back out of sight. "It doesn't even feel different when I speak it."

"That's because Parseltongue is an innate, hereditary anomaly—a dominant phenotype in the magical allele." Met with puzzled looks, Hermione sighed. "It's magic DNA. It's like—having red hair. To a redhead, it's just hair. They couldn't describe how it _feels_ different on their head, now could they? Maybe that's not the best example, but it's magic like the Metamorphmagus gene in the Black family, or the inborn Occlumency of the Sangfort family—but Parseltongue is rarer, and cannot be taught. The only known Parselmouths in Europe were from the fens, and they married into the Peverell family, descended into the Slytherin family, and eventually dwindled to the Gaunts. It gets a bit muddled in the genealogy texts, but both the Minister, Marvolo Gaunt the second, and Professor Slytherin, claim to be Salazar Slytherin's final living descendant. Both are Parselmouths."

"…and then there's me."

"It's odd," Elara remarked, idly flipping through a text. "Because while most every family in magical Britain can somehow trace their lineage back to a Peverell, none of the Potters have ever been Parselmouths. You're more closely related to the Blacks and would have had a better chance of being a Metamorphmagus. As far as I know, there's never been a recorded example of a Muggle-born Parselmouth—or Metamorphmagus, for that matter."

Elara and Hermione shared a significant look—and Harriet stiffened, catching the unspoken implication. "I swear, if one of you suggests my mum had an affair with Professor Slytherin's dad or something, I'll bloody hex you."

"What if Professor Slytherin _is_ your dad?" Elara smirked.

"I'm getting my wand!"

"Shh!"

The three witches paused to look about for Madam Pince, not realizing their voices had risen. "No one is suggesting any such thing, Harriet. We're getting off-topic; you said Parseltongue doesn't sound different from English. So, how do you know it's a snake?"

Harriet finished glowering at Elara and turned her attention to Hermione. "Snakes have a bit of an accent to them—I don't know how else to explain it. It's like…." She grappled for an example, biting her lower lip. "It's like Snape."

"Professor Snape?"

"Over the summer, if we saw him really early in the morning and he was tired, he sounded a bit like a Manc when he was telling us off. He doesn't usually sound like that, but you can tell, if you're looking for it."

Elara frowned, considering, and then nodded. "She's right. I hadn't realized it before, but he does sound somewhat Mancunian when he's irritated."

"That's like Parseltongue. I can't usually tell the difference unless I'm _really_ looking for it, and—well—I wasn't looking for it at first."

"It still makes no sense," Hermione said. "Either way we consider it, snake or wizard, _how_ are they getting about the castle unseen? How are they Petrifying people? For what reason?"

"Livius can be invisible," Elara pointed out.

"Yes, but last I checked, Horned Serpents can't Petrify people."

Harriet glanced at the lump snoozing on her chest and pulled her collar out, peeking at Livi. " _Hey_ ," she hissed. " _Can you Petrify people?_ "

" _What isss Petrify?_ "

" _Make them like stone._ "

" _Ssstupid. Ssstone isss not good for eating."_

Harriet smoothed her collar again and glanced at her friends, who watched the exchange with raised brows. "He says stone people would be gross, so I'm guessing that's a no."

"How very reassuring."

Hermione slammed a thick tome closed. "I can't find any mention of any invisible snakes aside from a few vague notations on Horned Serpents." Hermione's gaze dropped to Harriet's shirt with a displeased grimace. "And they're very rare. The Magical Menagerie is still offering a reward for Livius' return."

"Really? Maybe I'll sell him back—because the joke's on them, he does what he wants."

Elara snorted and Harriet giggled, but Hermione's frown intensified. "This isn't funny," she said. "I heard from a Gryffindor at breakfast that Colin Creevey is a Muggle-born. _I'm_ a Muggle-born. This is directly related to the Chamber, and whoever opened the Chamber did so to hurt Muggle-borns!"

The younger witches sobered. "I apologize, Hermione. You're right, it's not funny—but the Chamber itself might be a rouse. Someone with a grudge against Muggle-borns—and Professor Slytherin, apparently—might be claiming they opened the Chamber to discredit his name and detract attention from themselves."

"What if the Chamber has one of these in it?" Harriet said, spinning around her opened text to point out a picture of a serpentine woman who didn't seem to appreciate being pointed at very much. Vipers and cobras adorned her skull in an intricate weave of scales and fangs, the woman's golden eyes wide and furious, her mouth too wide and filled with far too many teeth. "A Gorgon? They Petrify people!"

"Gorgons are a Dark creature, and the only time one has ever been seen outside of Greece was in the fifteen-hundreds, when they brought one as part of a school tournament."

"Wh—what type of bloody tournament is that?!"

Hermione ignored the question. "It's true they Petrify people, but they have a notorious hatred for all wizards and witches alike—pure-blood, half-blood, or otherwise. It wouldn't explain how it's getting about, or why we haven't seen a dozen other people get Petrified as well."

"…a Gorgon in an Invisibility Cloak?"

"Honestly, Harriet."

The bespectacled witch took back _Most Macabre Monstrosities_ with a sigh and turned the page. The next entry depicted a large and ghastly looking creature not unlike an eel—a _basilisk_ , the proclaimed "King of Serpents." Harriet skimmed through the text, and though she noted some speculation on the serpent's extreme longevity and hatred for poultry, nothing was noted about Petrification. They were monstrous in size, and Harriet thought someone would be dead if something as terrifying as a basilisk was loose in the school.

"The professors know something they aren't telling us," Hermione muttered with a mutinous glance toward the library's entrance, making sure Pince wasn't about. "I think they _know_ where the Chamber is, and they _know_ what's been let out. It would make sense, it being Slytherin's chamber, if a snake of some kind came slithering out of it."

"It's been a thousand years, Hermione. Snakes don't live that long."

"Perhaps he left a colony of some kind behind, and they've reproduced."

"That's possible."

Hermione had a fervent look in her eyes as she leaned over the table, her voice lowered. "I don't think it's right they're keeping information to themselves, _especially_ when it pertains to Muggle-borns. I want to know what they know. I…I want—." She licked her lips, visibly anxious, and whispered, "I want to spy on them."

Elara was the first to break the answering silence. "No thanks, I'd like to live."

" _Elara_!"

"I'm serious. You say _them_ , but you clearly mean _Slytherin_ , and anyone willing to spy on the man must be cracked."

"This is something I have to do." Elara opened her mouth and Hermione cut her off. "You _had_ to have me make _that_ potion for you, regardless of legality, and you—." She pointed at Harriet, who froze as if Stunned. "You _had_ to hex Professor Slytherin to prove a point, so I assume you both understand when I say this is simply something I cannot drop or ignore. I'm going to pursue this, with or without you."

"All right, all right," Harriet placated, calming her friends down. Hermione was beginning to look like a furious, puffed up cat. "We'll help—we _will_ ," she added with a kick to Elara's chair. The Black heir grimaced. "But I don't see what we could do."

"You have your Invisibility Cloak."

"You mean the one Snape can see through with his funny eye?"

"That—that is a valid point, actually." Hermione deflated, scowling at the books as if they'd betrayed her. "There _has_ to be some way…."

She devolved into a muttering fit, and Elara glanced at Harriet, whispering, "This is mad, you know."

"I know."

"She wants us to eavesdrop on _professors_."

"I know," Harriet repeated, shrugging. "She's right about them not telling us something. You can't say you're not curious, too—and this is _Hermione_. If she has a plan, it'd be brilliant."

Elara grumbled something that sounded suspiciously like "Brilliantly stupid," and Harriet kicked her chair again, bruising her own toes. It was about that time that Madam Pince came around, shooing lingering students out of the library, ordering them off to supper. The trio of Slytherin witches stacked their books together and hurried them back to their respective shelves, then wandered back into the school.

"If we can't be _invisible_ ," Hermione said, speaking slowly, gathering her thoughts. "Then we could, perhaps, alter our appearances."

"Is there magic that does?"

"Oh, there's plenty of minor and major glamors—but I hazard a guess that Professor Snape might be able to see through them. Most of the staff can at least _detect_ them, and most are very complicated—. Anyway, any kind of disguise we wanted to use would have to be physical." She caught her bottom lip between her teeth and nibbled at it, lost in thought. "The best solution I can envision is the Polyjuice Potion."

Harriet didn't know what a Polyjuice Potion was, but Elara did, because she looked askance at Hermione and asked, "Do you actually have the recipe for that?"

"Well, no. It's in _Moste Potente Potions_ , isn't it? It's kept in the Restricted Section, and only N.E.W.T students—or someone with a teacher's note—can check it out."

Elara sighed and glanced heavenward. "Do you honestly think you can brew the potion?"

Hermione bristled. "What kind of question is that?"

"Then I'll get the book," Elara said, ignoring Hermione's hurt look. "I'm not doubting your ability, I'm asking you honestly. If you think you can brew it, then I will get the book."

"How are you going to manage that?"

"You'll see."

Harriet just shook her head. She really didn't like the sound of this spying stuff, but Hermione helped her all the time, and if this was something the other witch _needed_ , then Harriet would do whatever she could for her. Even if it meant participating in some dodgy eavesdropping.

Journeying on toward the Great Hall, she realized the volume of voices grew louder and louder, loud enough to warrant a puzzled glance between the three friends.

"What d'you think's going on?"

"…Perhaps someone else has been Petrified."

Hermione stole a sharp breath. "Hurry, let's go."

As it turned out, no one had been Petrified; instead, the commotion arose from the presence of a new person seated at the High Table next to Professor Dumbledore.

"Is that—?"

"That's Gilderoy Lockhart!" Hermione said, cheeks glowing pink. "Holy _cricket,_ why is he here?"

Harriet didn't know, but as they found their seats at the Slytherin table, she studied the blond wizard speaking rapidly to the Headmaster. Every so often he gave his hand an airy flip, and he used his blinding white smile to maximum effect. It seemed almost every girl in the hall was staring at the bloke, and when Professor Dumbledore rose from his chair, it took several minutes and a rather fierce reprimand from Snape to quiet everyone down. "Good evening! Before we partake in our excellent dinner this evening, I have an announcement to make. Please join me in welcoming Mr. Gilderoy Lockhart, who has been sent by our esteemed Minister for additional security while we investigate threats made against our students' safety. Welcome, Gilderoy!"

Professor Dumbledore started clapping, followed less enthusiastically by the staff—but notably not the majority of the Slytherin staff. Professor Slytherin himself watched Dumbledore and the gaudy wizard in robin's egg blue robes from the corner of his red eyes, his posture stiff and unwelcoming. Both Snape and Selwyn sat grim and upright like naughty children waiting for the other shoe to drop, and the other professors, though polite, brought their hands together and didn't look at all relieved.

"Thank you, Headmaster!" Lockhart said, reaching out to clap a hand on the older man's shoulder. "Nothing to fear now, I must say! The Minister himself chose me to deal with this Chamber nonsense, and you can be sure, with me on the watch, this will be sorted in a trice! I'll be on patrol, and if any of you have anything suspicious to report—or maybe just want an autograph from yours truly—." He tipped them all a wink, and Harriet saw a Hufflepuff seventh year fan herself, giggling. "Don't be afraid to come find me."

Harriet remembered then a bit of conversation between Dumbledore and McGonagall, talking about petitioning the Ministry for Aurors. The Minister sent… _Lockhart_? Lockhart wasn't an Auror, was he?

The older girls tittered and whispered, boys looking at them like they'd gone out of their gourds. Harriet didn't understand. The bloke was pretty, but he was also very…shiny, offensively glittery—and, after making her way through _Gadding with Ghouls_ , Harriet was almost entirely certain Lockhart ripped off Muggle literature to write his books. It was made-up, fantasy stuff. She couldn't be the only one who knew that—so why would the Minister send _Lockhart_ when Professor Dumbledore asked the Ministry for Aurors?

They ate their dinner amid excited chatter, finished, and though they needed to be in their dorms soon, Harriet urged her two friends out to one of the outer courtyards first. In the cold, low light of the gloaming hour, Harriet pulled Livi out from under her shirt, and the serpent complained bitterly of the chill before he moved off—invisible—into the sparse woods abutting the courtyard for exercise and something to eat.

"He's getting too big to be under your clothes," Elara remarked after several minutes of silent contemplation, her arms crossed and her gaze speculative.

Harriet sighed. "Hagrid's been encouraging me to make him hunt more and not just feed him off the table. You'd think he'd be getting less food, right? But he's gotten bigger."

"Perhaps it's an intrinsic trigger of his magic," Hermione said, coming out of her blush-fueled daze. "A survival mechanism encouraging growth to capture larger and more fulfilling prey."

"Maybe."

Hermione changed the subject. "That was…an interesting dinner. You did say Professor Dumbledore requested someone come from the Ministry?"

"Yeah, but I thought he wanted an Auror or someone better."

" _Better?_ Mr. Lockhart is—! Is very qualified! And—!"

"Pretty?" Harriet guessed, smirking when Hermione's face flamed again.

"Looks have nothing to do with it!" she barked. "Just look at all he's done!"

Elara, still gazing into the distance, had a puzzled look upon her face and didn't join in on Harriet's teasing.

"Hermione, that stuff he writes is all fiction, y'know?"

"It couldn't be. There—. Someone would have noticed, Harriet."

Harriet shook her head and crossed the courtyard, hissing until Livi chose to come slithering back, unsuccessful in his hunt and peeved for having been made to rouse his lazy bones. " _I_ noticed, didn't I?"

Her comment gave Hermione something else to stew over besides wondering what information the professors meant to keep from the school and students. Harriet hid Livi away again, tugging her cloak about her shoulders, and they returned to their common room. The trio brought out their homework, pushing aside dark, anxious thoughts about possible monsters in the castle—and though she was comforted by the familiar glow of the silver lanterns and the lake's deep murmurs, Harriet couldn't quite forget the feel of Colin Creevey's Petrified skin against her own.

Danger lurked somewhere in Hogwarts—danger that Harriet feared she and her friends might escape unscathed.

* * *

 **A/N: I highly doubt anyone knew that indirect eye contact with a Basilisk only Petrified a victim. There'd be no feasible way for wizards to test what would happen, and according to Newt Scamander in the Fantastic Beasts text, Basilisks hadn't been seen in England for some 400 years. There wasn't anything about Petrification in the Most Macabre Monstrosities entree.**

 **Anyway, some other notes real quick: I've had a few reviewers comment about Set and why I don't include him more. No, I haven't forgotten him (I promise). He's just not a major character, honestly, and his significance doesn't get explored until later in the series. I'll work on including him more simply as a point of interest, but for the most part, if Harriet's around people, he's not there. Another note, I've had some requests for a summary of events, and I've decided I'll make sure to include one at the beginning of each new part/year. So, we won't see it for awhile, but I hope it will be helpful! Thank you all so much for your reads, time, and reviews!**


	72. blithering idiot

**_lxxii. blithering idiot_**

Two weeks passed the students of Hogwarts by, and in those weeks it wasn't uncommon to hear Mr. Lockhart's loud, officious voice careening through the corridors whenever they headed off to class. He seemed to pop up everywhere: outside on the grounds when they strolled to Herbology, telling everyone who'd listen about the herd of Centaurs he befriended in Germany; in the Transfiguration corridor, strutting about in a cloak with literal peacock feathers on the hem; trailing Professor Flitwick, who couldn't walk fast enough to escape the man's lengthy stories. Harriet saw him try to give Snape advice on potioneering and she thought the poor blighter was going to lose a limb.

Annoying or not, however, there were no new spooky messages on the walls, instances of hissing voices, or Petrifications while Lockhart bandied about, and so Harriet assumed he was either brighter than he let on or was making such a nuisance of himself the invisible not-a-Gorgon couldn't keep on with their dastardly scheme. Sometimes the wizard trailed Longbottom, rambling about managing fame and expectations, trying to wrangle the Boy Who Lived into a book deal. "A seventy-thirty split in profits, of course, being my idea," Harriet heard Lockhart say one day, bracing herself against the need to roll her eyes. Used to the attention, Neville formed an easy camaraderie with the wizard, and managed to divert his attention back toward his other doting fans or the Chamber itself.

Harriet had never been so glad Professor Dumbledore decided to keep the truth of Voldemort and her scar a secret whenever she saw the pair together.

Though nothing of note happened for a fortnight, Hermione was still determined to brew a Polyjuice Potion and learn what the professors knew. Where that sudden, intense distrust came from, Harriet couldn't say—but she considered it possible Professor Quirrell's betrayal last term had shaken Hermione more than any of them knew. Certainly, Harriet had been terrified, but she'd never trusted authority figures to the extent Hermione did; her grade school teachers never took her side against Dudley, always reprimanding her to quit telling lies when she said he hit her. Being confronted with stark evidence of a professor's frankly _evil_ personage probably unsettled Hermione greatly.

It was a Thursday, an hour or so before class let out, and the second year Slytherins had their weekly free period. Harriet hurried along, already late to what was supposed to be a clandestine meeting with her friends…in a loo. Every witch knew the toilets on the second floor were bloody atrocious, what with Moaning Myrtle in residence, the ghost of an old student who haunted the place and popped through the stalls while you were trying to do your business. Of course, Harriet never had that issue because the ghosts always avoided her—which she suspected had something to do with Set, who was also the reason she was running late.

Why he felt the need to knock everything off of Runcorn's carrell like some prissy cat, Harriet would never know.

She hurried along, fidgeting with her robes until they laid flat, one sock shorter than the other, her hair more of a nightmare than usual after waking from an overlong afternoon nap. Harriet yawned as she hopped up the steps to the second floor—and paused, seeing Mr. Lockhart peeking into a broom cupboard. He didn't seem to be up to anything nefarious; rather, he looked peaky and nervous as he peered into the cupboard and fiddled with his wand as if trying to buck up the courage to open the door fully.

Harriet came up next to him, and though she didn't hear any suspicious snake voices, she pulled out her wand as well. "What're you looking for?"

Mr. Lockhart jumped half a foot in the air and nearly whacked Harriet in the face when he whipped his wand about and dropped the bloody thing on her head. Rubbing her scalp, Harriet scowled at the wizard and bent down to pick it up.

"You gave me a fright there!" Lockhart said with a weak attempt at a laugh, one hand on his chest. His blond hair flopped over his brow like the wet down of a half-soaked duck, the hem of his gaudy robes crooked as if he'd tripped over them a time or two. He accepted his wand back from her and pointed it again at the ajar door. "I say—what, what are you doing out of class at this hour?"

"Free period," Harriet replied, shrugging. She edged around him to see into the dark cupboard. "Is there something in there?" Harriet swore if Lockhart got her eaten by a cursed mop, she'd come back and haunt him.

"Ah—well, I'm on patrol—looking for ne'er-d0-wells, protecting everyone, as you like—and I heard a, uh, suspicious noise…."

Lockhart's normally blinding smile flickered, and he looked very near passing out when Harriet—growing impatient—nudged the door open fully with her foot. A sudden buzzing filled the air, something black and glittering darting toward them, and Lockhart shrieked as Harriet flicked her wand. " _Petrificus Totalus_!"

The wizard's shriek still echoed in the corridor as the two Doxies bounced off his head and fell, stiff as boards, to the floor below. Harriet gave Lockhart another harsh, disbelieving look, then bent to pluck the Doxies up and stuff them into a pocket. Livi had developed a taste for the gross things while at Grimmauld, so he'd appreciate the treat.

Meanwhile, Lockhart was quick to prevaricate, though the bloke sounded like he'd nearly had a heart attack, his voice warbling several octaves too high. "Thank you for the assistance—though I had it all under control, of course! Very dangerous, Doxies. Venomous, you know."

They were not, in fact, venomous in the slightest, but Harriet said, "Uh-huh," anyway. They stared at one another in awkward silence.

Harriet honestly couldn't see why the others were crazy over the wizard. She didn't understand. Was that what growing up did to you? The third year girls had attended a special class with Madam Pomfrey and had come back to the common room whispering about _hormones_ and _periods_ and _changes_ —all things Harriet did not like the sound of in the slightest, but unfortunately she'd have to deal with it sooner rather than later. Was that what made Hermione, the smartest witch Harriet knew, act like such a numpty whenever Lockhart came strutting by?

Harriet huffed. "You should write fiction."

"P-pardon?"

"Your books. You should write _your own_ fiction, considering there's not a lot of other wizarding fiction writers out there, and _yours_ isn't half bad. Then, you wouldn't get sent by the Ministry to do these kinds of things and make a total hash of it."

Lockhart paled, then goggled at Harriet like she'd shouted something vaguely obscene and highly offensive. He didn't say anything in response, and so the bespectacled witch took the chance to scurry off, leaving the fancy wizard gobsmacked in the hallway. She made it to the loo without further incident, pushed in the door—and found Elara and Hermione inside, staring at a wall.

"Err—what are you doing?" She felt like she was asking that a lot today.

Hermione blinked and stirred. "You're late," she said, more from reflex than a need to chastise. "Myrtle was here a moment ago, complaining as she always does—and then she stopped mid-sentence, gasped, and flew through that wall there."

"I told you it meant Harriet was almost here," Elara commented.

"I always thought it a coincidence the ghosts never appeared around her, but now I'm not as certain. Maybe it has something to do with your curse scar? Ghosts are highly sensitive to magic and might be repelled by it."

"Mmm," Harriet replied. Hermione might not have noticed the evasion, but Elara did, her gaze sharpening as the shorter witch quickly cleared her throat and changed the subject. "Anyway, sorry I'm late. Got distracted out in the hall—so why d'you want us here?"

Shaking her head, Hermione returned her attention to the matter at hand. "I thought this would make an excellent place to begin brewing the Polyjuice; no one ever comes in here because of Myrtle."

"Yeah? Well, what _about_ Myrtle? Will she tattle on us?"

"I couldn't say, honestly. According to _Hogwarts: A History,_ the ghosts are under no obligation to report on the students to the staff unless they're injured or a threat to others—but they're also under no obligation to keep silent, either. I believe Myrtle's just bored and lonely enough to not go reporting us to Professor Dumbledore."

Harriet nodded along, though she had a queasy feeling in her stomach at the thought of brewing a potion in a ghost's loo. It didn't sound very sanitary to her.

"Did you manage to get the book, Elara?"

The taller witch inclined her head and reached into her robe pocket, revealing a book loosely bound in brown paper she quickly shed.

"That's not from the library," Hermione said slowly.

"It's from _a_ library. That library being my own." Elara held the book out to Hermione, and Harriet could see the familiar crest on the bottom of the spine as the witch impatiently waved the tome about when Hermione failed to grasp it. "I had Kreacher send it to me from home. Mind, I'll probably return for the hols and find out he's tossed the whole library searching for it, but this is still much simpler than trying to bribe a teacher into signing a permission slip for the Restricted Section."

Grumbling, Hermione took the book and cradled it gently in her hands. "Oh, gross."

"Gross?" Harriet asked.

"It feels—." Her nose scrunched, handing the text over. "Not pleasant."

Indeed, when Harriet's fingers brushed the cover, she was almost overcome with the sudden desire to hurl the book as far as she could. It felt as if she'd taken hold of something not quite solid, a half-frozen gelatinous thing that sent a sharp prickling alighting through her hand and danced in her skin like tiny little feet. It felt—familiar, but uncomfortable, like the stuffy dark of the cupboard at Privet Drive. Harriet did _not_ like it and quickly shoved it back to her friend.

"It's a text of Dark magic that's sat in a Dark house for decades, Hermione. Of course it's _not pleasant_."

Shivering once, Hermione lowered herself to sit on the damp floor in front of the sinks and Elara and Harriet did the same—though Elara opted for perching on her bag, folding her hands together on her knees, curling her lip slightly. As Hermione parted the book and began looking through the pages, Harriet peered at the room itself. Everything was slightly off-color, drab with dust and age, the floor stained by years of water damage, cobwebs bearding the ceiling like fungus under a log. All the mirrors had long since been broken, the window itself obscured by limescale as thick as Harriet's finger. It was a distinctly unsavory place, exactly where someone might find illegal potions brewing going on.

"Here." Hermione spread the book open in her lap, running a single fingertip down a page crammed with tiny print and gruesome drawings. "This is it here. Hmm…" She turned the page, frowning. "…it's a tad more complicated than I'd hoped, what with the leeches needing to be bled as to not contaminate it, and it'll take twenty-one days for the lacewing flies to stew. The knotgrass also presents a problem, as it needs to be harvested under a full moon. Some of the rest will be difficult to procure."

Elara's brow rose, and she craned her neck to look at the book without scooting closer on the grubby floor. "Could we buy the flies? I don't know if Slug and Jiggers would take the order, but there _are_ other apothecaries."

"No," Hermione said, still reading. "The fee would be exorbitant, and I wouldn't trust whoever filled the order to stew them properly. Besides, not many potions call for stewed lacewing flies; any potioneer with half a brain would know what we were up to." She sunk her teeth into her lower lip as she carefully closed the book again, a small furrow appeared between her brows. "We should be able to start right away. I have my kit and spare cauldron, and the flies themselves are used in standard potion making. The second part of the brew will be a bit…difficult, but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it." She smiled, shaking out her bushy hair as she climbed back to her feet. "In the end, I hope all this is unnecessary. Mr. Lockhart should be able to catch whoever is causing this chaos, and we can get back to studying without worrying about being Petrified…."

She said the words, and yet Harriet knew Hermione didn't feel them; they rang hollow, empty, and the other witch wouldn't quite meet their eyes as she tucked Elara's smuggled book into her satchel and brought out a collapsible cauldron so she could start on the flies. Elara took the opportunity to leave, muttering about Snape and making sure no one went looking for them and caught them out making mischief. Harriet helped Hermione begin prepping ingredients, working in companionable silence, and once they moved the cauldron into one of the stalls, she leaned against the partition and stared into the dark, bubbling water.

Hermione hoped all this wouldn't be necessary, but it would be, because Gilderoy Lockhart was a fraud, and Harriet suspected the adults were well aware of that fact. Why, then? Why bring him? Why would the Minister send a blithering idiot to Hogwarts in their time of need?

Grim, Harriet didn't think she would like the answer to those questions.


	73. dueling club

**_lxxiii. dueling club_**

"A Dueling Club?" Elara muttered as Daphne Greengrass nodded her head. "He can't be serious."

They sat together in Transfiguration, a pile of glossy patterned buttons on the desk before Elara, several tired beetles fleeing the idle motions of Daphne's absentminded wand. "It was officially put on the board this morning in the common room," the blonde girl said. "It's going to be held at the beginning of the month, and _apparently_ Lockhart's got an assistant helping him with actual demonstrations."

Parkinson, seated in front of them, turned in her chair when McGonagall walked away and leaned her elbows on their table. "Are you talking about the Dueling Club?" she asked in an undertone. Again, Daphne nodded. "It's so exciting! Who do you think is going to assist him?"

"Not Professor Slytherin," Daphne said, poking at a beetle. "I heard from Morag MacDougal in Ravenclaw that _she_ heard Mr. Lockhart talking with Professor Slytherin after their lesson on Tuesday, asking if he'd be up for supervising the club—and Slytherin apparently all but _threw_ Mr. Lockhart out of his classroom."

"Can you blame him? Anyone who has to assist _the_ Gilderoy Lockhart is going to be humiliated." Pansy sighed, and Daphne did the same. Elara just stared at the pair.

Not for the first time, Elara wondered if there was something wrong with her—because she felt none of the nervous, twitterpated energy the other girls did when discussing Lockhart. She knew Harriet didn't either, but that was because Harriet was one of the youngest in their year, and far more interested in adventure stories, snakes, and curious bits of magic. Elara was _aware_ of Lockhart in a way Harriet was not, but only in so far as to recognize him as a wizard, a dunce, and a source of constant, gibbering gossip.

It seemed almost every girl near enough to thirteen and above turned into a moon-faced fool whenever Lockhart came up in conversation, and it _baffled_ Elara, who felt very much like the only person at a party who hadn't sipped the spiked punch.

"Miss Parkinson," Professor McGonagall snapped as she paced up the aisle again. "I'm sure you're only discussing the best way to go about turning your beetles into buttons, but turn your attention back to your own desk now."

Pansy grimaced, then wiped her face clean as she sat forward. "Yes, Professor McGonagall."

The professor narrowed her eyes and pursed her lips in a thin line as if contemplating a point deduction, but she eventually moved on to the desk behind Elara, where Harriet had managed to turn her beetles in buttons about the size of dinner plates. She quickly tried to fix the problem with a Shrinking Charm. "I _saw_ that, Miss Potter. You should be getting the spell right on the first try, not correcting it with another."

"But what does it matter, professor?" Harriet complained. "So long as the buttons are the right size in the end?"

"Because I would be remiss in my teaching if my students had to supplement all their half-baked Transfiguration attempts with Charms, and in the future you will come across far more complex magic that cannot be hedged in such a fashion. Now—." She flicked her wand, and the buttons turned back into regular-sized beetles. "—try again, Miss Potter, and _concentrate_."

 **xXxXx**

Classes continued as they always did, and December descended upon the castle with subtle morning frosts and thick storm clouds lingering just beyond the mountains. Soon everyone knew about the Dueling Club, and it was impossible for go anywhere without hearing someone whispering speculation on what they'd encounter. No one knew for certain what kind of talent Lockhart truly had for dueling since his books only held vague references to any actual battles between the wizard and the forces of darkness, but the more Lockhart toted his skills, the more Elara doubted he had any at all.

She was certain Professor Slytherin was going to hex him bloody any day now.

By the time the first meeting arrived on a cold, brisk evening at the end of the first week, Elara had grown tired of hearing about it, and only conceded to attending because Harriet—for all her disdain of Lockhart—was eager to learn more about dueling. She and Hermione dragged Elara out of the dungeons by the arm, joining the flood of students headed toward the Great Hall.

The room had been adjusted to suit the meeting's needs. The House tables hemmed the walls, a long, narrow platform now occupying the middle of the hall, around which everyone pushed and jockeyed for the best viewing position. The watching portraits squawked in indignation as neighbors and other painted people squeezed into their frames, a woman beating a pushy knight over the head with her washing board after he nudged her into the tub of sudsy water. No adults had arrived yet.

The trio of Slytherin witches looked for good spots but found themselves shuffled toward the back with the other first and second-years. Harriet grumbled when she ended up stuck behind a sixth-year almost double her height.

"Here, Harriet, stand here…."

Hermione and the shorter witch switched places, and more students came trickling into the hall, jostling the others around. Elara turned to look deeper into the hall itself, and so she didn't see who Harriet bumped into before she heard her let out a brief, pained hiss.

"Oh, hello, Luna and Ginny," Hermione said to the pair of first-year girls, frowning at Harriet. Ginny followed Hermione's look with a nervous smile.

"Hey," she replied. "Sorry about that, Pot—Harriet."

The bespectacled witch waved the apology away, though she had a bit of a pinched expression, scratching at her shoulder.

"How are you both doing?" Hermione asked. "Are your classes going well?"

They exchanged brief chatter—well, Hermione and Ginny did, while Luna hummed softly and Elara gave the girl a skeptical look. She was…odd. They were related through Elara's mother, the McKinnons and Lovegoods being cousins, close enough that Elara sometimes wondered why she hadn't been sent to them when she was an infant. She often ruminated on all the possible reasons she'd landed in a Muggle orphanage instead of with a magical relation. Uncle Cygnus never gave her a clear answer beyond thinking she had been dead.

Maybe they just didn't want to house the _madman's daughter._

"Hello, hello!" Elara jerked herself out of her wandering thoughts as Mr. Lockhart came bounding up the steps onto the platform. She said _bounding_ because that was exactly what he did; the foppish wizard lifted his knees high and affected a slightly breathless air, dressed in a high-collared duelist's coat, a frilly pattern printed into the light fabric, his boots heeled and buckled along his narrow calves. He looked something like the Christian knights in St. Giles' nursery stories, golden and boisterous and clean, chest thrown out, smile bright. The inadvertent comparison made Elara uneasy. "Can you all hear me? Good, excellent! I'm so glad you could attend this little Dueling Club of mine the Headmaster and the Ministry have allowed me to set up!"

By now, most of the student body had filtered into the hall, and though the few hundred students usually fit quite well in the space, the platform crowded the room's middle and everyone jostled for better spots close to the front. Claustrophobia needled her, and Elara forced herself to stand up straight and stop wringing her gloves, breathing in a sharp, quick breath. Harriet glanced at her, curious.

A flicker of black in the corner of her eye turned Elara's head. True, the majority of the crowd wore their dark school robes and so a bit of black cloth shouldn't have held her attention, but no one could match the seething pillar that Snape resembled as he came gliding up the steps after Lockhart, still dressed in his teaching robes and wool coat. He stood there in stark contrast to Mr. Lockhart, looking very much like the celebrated author had dragged him out of his dungeons just for this event, and Snape had gone unwillingly.

Lockhart continued to prattle, and Elara heard him say, "And of course you know my assistant! Professor Snape has gallantly offered his services tonight, but never fear! I'll leave your professor in one piece, I swear it! Thanks for being a good chap, Severus!"

Snape—the wretched misanthrope—fairly oozed discontent, his arms crossed, eyes glinting, though Lockhart either didn't notice or didn't care. Elara could think of a few things to call the wizard, and none of them were " _good chap_."

"Can Professor Snape duel?" whispered a first-year Hufflepuff, turning her head toward her friend, who shrugged.

Expression grim, Ginny muttered, "He'd have to."

"Why do you say that?" Hermione asked.

"Because he was suspected of—you know."

"I know what?"

"That—err, never mind."

Elara blinked, curious but unwilling to follow through with their conversation. _Know what?_ Harriet, for her part, acted as if she hadn't heard a word spoken, and was peering intently at Snape and Lockhart, craning her neck to see between the bodies of the taller students in front of her.

"Now! The first spell I'll be showing you is an absolute necessity in a master duelist's repertoire: the Disarming Charm. The incantation is _expelliarmus_. Everyone got that?"

A few of the older years scoffed, obviously knowing the spell already, while others repeated the word to various success under their breath. Snape continued to stand immobile at one end of the platform, jaw set, and Elara would have thought him Petrified if not for the impatient tapping of his index finger against his arm. Lockhart pranced— _pranced_ , honestly, even Hermione with all her infatuated hero-worship was beginning to look chagrined—to his own side of the platform and spun about, yanking his wand out of the blue sash slung about his hips. Striking a pose, he pointed it at Professor Snape.

"Are you ready, Professor?"

Snape didn't look ready, since he hadn't shifted from his stiff, indolent stance with his arms crossed. He hadn't even taken out his wand. He sneered, and in the answering hush, softly said, "Get on with it, _Gilderoy_."

Mr. Lockhart faltered for a moment, an uneasy shift pulling at his arms and causing him to shuffle his feet. Snape did nothing. "Ah, all right, then. If you're certain. Prepare yourself! _Expelliarmus_!"

He gave his wand a jaunty little jab and it expelled a burst of crimson light. The spell moved…not _slowly_ , but Elara had anticipated something quicker than what she saw, something worthy of being a _disarming_ Charm. It flew toward Snape at a steady clip—and, without ceremony, Professor Snape simply stepped to one side, like a vulture shuffling over on its branch, and the spell continued until it hit the Great Hall's doors with a light smack. Lockhart blinked, dropping his pose. "I, uh—?"

Snape's sneer morphed into a smirk, and the wizard finally uncrossed his arms, his black wand descending into his pale fingers when he flicked his wrist. From one second to the next, he stepped forward, lifted his hand, and snarled, _"Expelliarmus_!"

The red light streaked down the platform and Lockhart didn't have time to blink before it struck him in the chest, throwing the wizard back and right off the edge of the platform into a group of watching witches. They shrieked and squealed, but they did manage to break Lockhart's fall before he split his head like an egg on the stone floor. Dazed, winded, and disheveled, Mr. Lockhart stumbled to his feet with the help of his overeager audience, and his voice came out in a thready whine when he spoke.

"Yes, yes—thank you, Professor Snape! Of—of course, I knew what you meant to do, and I could have easily countered it, but it's always good to give a demonstration."

"Oh?" Snape lifted a brow. "Shall I _demonstrate_ it again, then?"

Lockhart's eyes widened, and he finally noticed the other wizard meant him sincere bodily harm, because he chortled a rather high-pitched laugh and shook his head. "No, no! That won't be necessary, Severus. Ah—why don't you all split into pairs and practice now? Yes, that'd be good…."

The students in the hall turned to their friends with excited grins, finally putting distance between themselves and the overcrowded edge of the platform. Malfoy oozed out of the crowd like the irritating pond scum he was and challenged Harriet to a duel, but the bespectacled witch merely rolled her eyes and turned away. Annoyed by the lack of response, Malfoy focused his attention on Longbottom—who was near enough with his Gryffindor friends—instead. Luna and Gina paired off, as did Crabbe and Goyle, Finnigan and Thomas, leaving Elara to face Hermione and Harriet with Ronald Weasley.

The redhead shrugged, then lifted his wand. Elara narrowed her eyes when she noticed the Spell-O-Tape wrapped about it in clumsy, uneven layers, the tip crooked, and a fission of alarm went through her when sparks dribbled from the wrong end. She'd seen his dismal work in Defense all term, of course, but she hadn't seen his wand from this proximity before. It looked liable to burst into flames at any second. _Is that unicorn hair poking out of the side?!_

Elara didn't have a chance to say anything, because Snape came swooping over and snatched Harriet back from Weasley by the scruff of her neck. Harriet balked and probably would have lost her balance if Snape hadn't held her upright. "Put that worthless stick down before you blind someone, Weasley," he snapped, shunting Harriet over to a single, first-year Hufflepuff, who paled when confronted with an irked Slytherin witch. "Have you even written to your mother yet about having that replaced, boy?"

He harangued Weasley for a bit, the boy's ears going red, and Elara let her attention wander back to Hermione.

"Is everyone prepared?" Lockhart called from the platform, his hands on his hips and his attire returned to order, though a fresh bruise colored his cheek. "Excellent! Now, on the count of three, you will attempt to disarm your opponent! One, two—."

Loud bangs and shouts drowned out the remainder of Lockhart's count as students fired spells at one another. " _Expelliarmus,_ " Hermione said with perfect pronunciation, and Elara's wand slipped from her fingers. She fumbled for it while all around the Great Hall different hexes and jinxes bounced against the walls and floor, portraits fleeing, a paltry yellow haze spilling into the air, and Lockhart had to duck before a stray spell could clip his head.

"Stop—stop!" he cried.

Snape's eyes flicked toward the other wizard and narrowed. Though Elara couldn't hear it, she saw the man take in a visible, aggravated breath before shouting, " _Finite Incantatem!_ " louder than she'd ever heard him speak before. The various bursts of light and sound died when Snape swept his wand around the hall, nullifying the active hexes and jinxes and banishing the ugly haze. His glare alone proved sufficient enough to part the Weasley twins, whose duel had quickly devolved into a wrestling match. Silence descended, uneasy eyes turned to the professor.

"Perhaps, _Gilderoy_ ," Snape said as he slid his wand back into his sleeve. "It would be best if you selected a single pair for another demonstration instead of unleashing the ill-behaved horde upon one another."

Lockhart cleared his throat and nodded along with what the Potions Master said. "Yes, of course—splendid idea. Took the words right out of my mouth! Let's see here—ah, yes! Neville! Why don't you and your partner come on up here and show us how it's done?"

Longbottom shot Mr. Lockhart an easy, practiced grin, and replied, "Sure, sir," before starting toward the steps. Draco, his partner, followed after the Boy Who Lived with his pointy nose in the air, though he looked less confident than he had earlier once he found himself on the platform facing his opponent. Neville, for all that he was a fake, exasperating twit, was still second in their year for Defense, lagging behind Harriet alone—who was currently on her knees apologizing profusely to the teary-eyed Hufflepuff she'd thrown off her feet with the Disarming Charm.

Stepping off the platform and out of the line of fire, Lockhart called out, "All right, gentlemen! On the count of three, you will attempt to disarm each other! Disarm _only_ , now! Nothing else! One, two _—_!"

" _Flipendo!_ " Malfoy yelled before the count came to an end, hoping to catch Longbottom unprepared, but Neville was quick to use a Shield Charm. His feet slid a few inches from the impact, and then he retaliated.

" _Locomotor Wibbly!_ "

The Jelly-Legs Curse clipped Malfoy when he tried to dodge, and the blond collapsed onto his backside among loud cheers from the Gryffindors. Longbottom smirked, bowed, and the cheers became laughter. Growing red in the face, Malfoy canceled the curse on his lower half and scrambled upright, scowling something fierce as he thrust his wand toward the bowing boy's back. " _Serpensortia!_ "

A collective gasp went through the students as a blur erupted from the tip of Malfoy's wand, and that gasp morphed into spooked shrieks when the blur solidified into three feet of hooded snake, the creature landing on the platform as Longbottom whipped around, his eyes wide and frightened. The cobra hissed and coiled in upon itself. Neville didn't move.

Scoffing, Snape yet again found his own wand and waded forward, shifting aside students so he could reach the platform's edge. "Allow me, Longbottom—."

"No, no! I have it!" Lockhart called, and Elara didn't quite hear what spell he used, but she flinched like everyone else when the snake ascended several yards into the air, then came down with a loud _thwap!_ The cobra writhed, body rolling—and it abruptly rose, hood wide, hissing with menace as it looked at Neville and bared curved fangs.

Eyes locked on it, Harriet stepped forward—and dread filled Elara's heart.

Sometimes she pondered why Harriet had landed in Slytherin. The bespectacled witch had all the qualities upheld by the House of Serpents, certainly—but what Elara thought most people failed to understand was that _everyone_ had all the qualities of _every_ House to varying degrees, and the Sorting Hat sought that which _would_ best define and complete its wearer during their years at Hogwarts. For all her cunning, her perseverance, pride, and those spots of gleaming ambition, Elara often couldn't understand how Harriet didn't wind up in Gryffindor when she could be so utterly, completely, and _stupidly_ reckless.

Reckless as she was being right now.

Elara didn't think; she pushed past Snape, grabbed a handful of Harriet's robes, and yanked the shorter witch back while everyone else stared at the scene unfolding on the platform. A sound of protest escaped Harriet, and Elara slapped a gloved hand over her mouth, dragging her until she brushed the stone wall. "Don't you _dare!_ "

The cobra darted toward Longbottom—and Snape lunged, snarling " _Vipera Evanesca!_ "

The Boy Who Lived shouted as he fell back, and the snake vanished in a whisper of smoke and ash.

Harriet pulled Elara's hand away from her face and spun on her heels, real anger in her green eyes as she glowered at her friend. "What the _hell_ , Elara!"

"I only stopped you from being an idiot," Elara retorted, her own temper prickling in her tone as the volume rose in the hall and the so-called Dueling Club started to dissolve. Lockhart had no control now, and no one else wanted to get on the platform after watching Longbottom almost get bit by a venomous snake. "You need to _think_ before you act sometimes, Harriet!"

"He could have _died!_ "

Snape—having witnessed Harriet's lapse in judgment—set upon them immediately, bending at the waist to bring his furious face lower and speak for their benefit alone. "What part of your imbecilic little brain doesn't understand the concept of _keeping a secret_?" he demanded of Harriet, baring crooked teeth. "Do you have _any_ idea the kind of retribution that would have been unleashed upon yourself had you revealed _that_ ability in the school's current _climate_?"

Elara knew. Had Harriet exposed herself as a Parselmouth, the school would have turned on her in an instant. She couldn't be certain what Professor Slytherin would do, but merely imaging his possible reactions made Elara queasy.

"I was—I just wanted to help!"

"He was in no danger and did not need your bloody help!" Snape spat. Both girls jumped when he swore. "You would have been ostracized—targeted by simpletons and those of superstitious minds, and Merlin only knows what would have occurred when— _when_ , Potter, not _if_ —the Ministry caught wind of this! They would have hauled you in for an inquiry, twelve-years-old or no! They would have turned your dorm upside down and found that wretched serpent of yours. They'd throw you in Azkaban, Potter, _Azkaban!_ "

By now, people had started filtering out of the Great Hall, but some paused and looked back as Snape's voice rose in volume. The Potions Master noted their audience and forcibly calmed himself, seeming to count under his breath while Harriet's face reddened and she swallowed the urge to cry. Guilt and rage and fear flickered across her scrunched features, and Elara reached out to touch her arm, wanting to comfort her—but Harriet jerked away.

"I didn't! I didn't _mean_ to!"

Snape straightened to his full height and crossed his arms, not a single ounce of pity in his harsh expression. Hermione still lingered, but she didn't approach, as she hadn't seen what Harriet did and didn't understand what was happening. Longbottom—shaken and sweaty, leaning on Ron's shoulder—was still in the Great Hall as well, and he cast a suspicious look in their direction that Elara met with a foreboding scowl until he moved away.

"And have I not told you time and time again you must master your instincts, girl? Whether or not you _meant_ it is immaterial. Does a disaster need to occur before it sinks in that you are not expected to act in these situations? That your responsibility is to yourself first? Have a care with your damn safety, Potter!"

Harriet stared at her shoes as she trembled and tried to hide the tears welling behind her lashes. Snape gave no mercy.

"Go back to the common room. Get out of my sight."

Elara tried to grab Harriet's hand again, but the other witch bolted before she could, disappearing into the dwindling throng without a backward glance. Snape turned his simmering attention to Elara and flicked his hand after the fleeing girl. "Go. Find her before she lands herself in more trouble than she already has."

"You didn't have to be so cruel," Elara muttered in response. Snape's lip curled.

"You're just as thick-headed as she is, Black. You and your cohorts _must_ keep your heads down and _think_. Given you stopped her before she could make such a monumental mistake, I assumed you cared more for the ungrateful brat's well-being than my perceived _cruelty_. Maybe I'm wrong. Perhaps you can both find a nice cell in Azkaban near your _father's_ if you carry on with this negligent attitude."

The Potions Master departed with those cutting words, his robe billowing in his passage, leaving Elara to stand enraged and frustrated with what few students remained. Lockhart sat on the platform's edge fielding comments and questions from his fawning admirers, and the sight only served to further irritate Elara. Several of the nearest floating candles guttered and dribbled wax before going out. She clenched her jaw and tried to stop her fists from shaking.

 _Hateful git._

"Elara…?" came Hermione's tentative question. "What was that all about? What happened?" She bit her lip. "Is Harriet all right?"

Letting the anger go, Elara breathed in, and the candles stopped burning themselves to nothing. "We should go back to the common room and find her," she said. There was nothing else they could do, really. Everything Snape said was true, whether or not Elara or Harriet wanted to believe him. Hogwarts was not safe at the moment, especially not for a Parselmouth Slytherin in possession of an illegally obtained Horned Serpent, an inquisitive Muggle-born, or the Heiress of a Dark family with far too many dubious journals tucked inside her school bag. They needed to be _careful._ They needed to _think_. "Come on, I'll explain on the way…."

* * *

 **A/N: I can't remember exactly how the Dueling Club went and I haven't got my books with me, but oh well xD I don't like repeating canon scenes verbatim anyway. I know Snape's a bit of bastard at the end, but he probably had a mini-heart attack when Harriet almost outed herself as a Parselmouth in front of the whole school. That would have been very, very bad.**

 **Hope everyone stays healthy and safe out there!**


	74. thief's honor

**_lxxiv. thief's honor_**

In the wake of the Dueling Club's first—and most likely last—meeting, Hermione had come to two conclusions.

One, Gilderoy Lockhart was not nearly as talented and successful as he presented himself, and the realization punctured Hermione's budding infatuation like a lance through a balloon. Not that she'd ever admit to that infatuation, of course; it was embarrassing enough to think she'd found him so riveting and gallant when the wizard couldn't defeat an opponent not holding their wand or Vanish a golem before it attacked a student. _How absurd._

Secondly, Harriet Potter had a problem with impulse control.

She wasn't thoughtless, no matter what Professor Snape said. No, if anything, Harriet was quite _thoughtful_ ; she always answered her letters in a timely manner, asked after people's welfare, helped first-years who needed assistance with directions or homework, and lent a hand when Hermione cleaned up her texts in the library. What Harriet lacked was faith in authority—and Hermione didn't mean the Ministry or the Headmaster. Subconsciously, the other girl simply had far too much difficulty understanding she didn't need to always _act_ , whether to help someone or protect or attack another, because she'd never had someone to depend on in her life. The thought of it wrenched Hermione's heart.

If Elara hadn't noticed her that evening, if Harriet had stepped up and commanded that cobra away from Longbottom—oh, Hermione could visualize the resulting chaos with ease, and it sank heavily in her middle like a stone. Soon enough, rumor would have twisted Harriet into some sort of terrible, bigoted monster, and witnesses would have sworn they saw her egging the snake on, urging it to attack Neville or even Lockhart. Azkaban hadn't been an idle threat given by the Potions Master.

Hermione had several hypotheses on how Professor Slytherin would react if he discovered Harriet's ability, and few had favorable conclusions. Elara once made the joking comment that Professor Slytherin and Harriet might be related, and naturally Hermione disagreed—but, in the privacy of her own thoughts, she _did_ have to wonder if Lily Potter had been indiscreet with Slytherin's father, Slytherin himself, or perhaps Minister Gaunt. Parselmouths didn't appear out of nowhere—not in Britain, at any rate. There was a connection between Slytherin and Harriet, though the exact nature of that connection had yet to be revealed.

Harriet spent much of the weekend quiet and withdrawn, sitting with them at their favored table in the common room but contributing little to the conversation. Truly, Hermione wished she had the right words to comfort the other witch, that she was as empathetically competent as others and could inherently know what Harriet needed—but Hermione found herself far too distracted by thoughts of the Chamber and their maturing Polyjuice to give Harriet her full attention.

It never strayed far from her mind. There hadn't been an attack for almost a month, but Hermione little doubted the perpetrator was still at large and simply biding their time. Harriet and Elara tried to understand her urgency—but they couldn't, because they were of magical blood from magical families, and they didn't feel the same sting of revolted eyes on her person, didn't hear upper years like Accipto Lestrange and his cronies whisper, " _Hopefully the Heir does a bit of House cleaning for us_." The first time Hermione heard the word _Mudblood_ she'd thought it absurd sounding, and yet with each spat repetition, the word started to weigh heavier and heavier upon her, as if by the mere fault of birth, she carried with her all of magical society's problems, and couldn't wipe the stain off.

 _Mudblood._

Hermione shook herself and forced her mind back to the present. She, Elara, and Harriet stood cramped together in the stall in Myrtle's loo, looking down at the softly simmering potion perched on the toilet—the clean, empty toilet Hermione purposefully disconnected from the pipes so Myrtle wouldn't flood their brew. Harriet still looked queasy at the idea of drinking anything concocted in a loo, though Hermione assured her she came by every day during lunch and after dinner to make certain nothing fell in or disturbed it.

"We have a…bit of a problem," Hermione said as she nibbled her lip and fussed with the ladle, making sure the wings didn't clump and burn at the bottom.

"Is there something wrong with it?"

"Not at the moment, no." She lowered the ladle, hooking the curved end on the cauldron's lip to keep it in place. "Right now, everything is coming along perfectly. It's the next step that will prove—difficult."

Elara and Harriet grimaced in unison.

"We need bicorn horn and boomslang skin—male boomslang skin, I should say, as the text specifies the green coloration—." Hermione breathed out, frustrated with her own urge to prattle. "Boomslangs aren't rare, per se, but they aren't exactly thick on the ground in the Scottish highlands."

Harriet snorted.

"The skin has to be imported from Africa and isn't readily available to the public. It has to be ordered through shop inventory catalogs, issued against a registered license to an apothecary, alchemist, researcher, Healer, or Potions Master. We could, potentially, attempt to attain some through the Muggle world—but we haven't the contacts for that, honestly, and it could take—."

"Months," Elara finished for her, folding her arms against her middle, eyes downcast in thought. Harriet leaned on the stall's partition, but Elara steadfastly refused to touch anything in the loo, even with her gloves on. "We'd also run into difficulties getting the skin here, since it's not like Muggle post can be delivered to any of our homes, is it?"

"Exactly—and the bicorn horn is a restricted substance. Demand often outweighs supply because it's needed in so many different potions, and the Ministry has issued several mandates against bicorn poaching—or so I saw in my research."

"I don't know what a bicorn is, but do you think Hagrid has one?" Harriet asked. "If he does, will he let us have a horn? We don't—err—have to kill it for that, do we?"

"No, a bicorn sheds its horns, but only once a year, and only in the spring. Even if he has a bicorn, he won't have kept the horns himself."

The trio shared worried glances. "What d'you think we should do, Hermione?"

"Well…" the eldest witch hedged, uncertain how her idea would be received. "We're in luck, because we have all the ingredients we need right here at Hogwarts. We simply need to—erm— _borrow_ them from…Professor Snape's private stores."

Harriet turned green and Elara shut her eyes. She grimaced.

"Hermione, the wizard knows where Harriet and I live during the summer. He sleeps in the bedroom above mine. On the off-chance he didn't have us expelled, he would make our lives very, _very_ miserable if we were caught."

"You won't get caught," Hermione asserted. "None of us will get caught—and I will do the stealing."

Elara's brow rose as she opened her eyes again. "Are you certain this is worth the risk? The chance we'll find out anything worthwhile is already slight, and this complicates things, Hermione. A lot."

"I will do it without you if I must. It's important," Hermione replied, squaring her shoulders. Harriet had yet to say anything, and Hermione knew by the look on her face that stealing from Professor Snape might prove more than she could stomach. "We won't get caught," she reasserted, speaking softer. "I promise you. But, you needn't do anything you're uncomfortable with, Harriet. I won't ask that of you."

Harriet gave a weak smile and fiddled with her spectacles, pushing them farther up her nose. "It's okay, Hermione. I'll do what you need."

A wash of gratitude went through Hermione and she squeezed Harriet's arm in thanks. "Now, we just need an idea of how to break into Snape's stores. He keeps them in his office, warded—you remember, don't you? We saw the room some weeks ago, and I specifically remember seeing bicorn horns in a wire basket by several other keratin-based appendages. The shape of them is quite distinctive"

"Err…'keratin-based appendages?'"

"Hair, horns, scales, fingernails."

"Oh, gross."

Hermione dragged a hand through her errant curls and tucked the worst offenders back behind her ears. "Really, the problem we have is opening the portrait. Professor Snape didn't use any magic when he pulled the portrait aside; I assume the wards are simply keyed to his touch. If we mean to get into his stores, we can't simply try to break in at night or even while he's busy in classes, not unless we can figure out what type of ward he's laid on the portrait, and I doubt we'd be able to figure it out without extensive experimentation—the kind of experimentation that would be impossible to undertake without his noticing."

"So…what you're saying is, we need Snape to open the door first."

Grim, Hermione nodded. She knew how ridiculous that sounded. "It's the only way."

"Bloody hell. We might as well just ask for the detentions now."

A small, despondent part of Hermione agreed and thought she'd bitten off more than she could chew with this aspiration. Though she didn't have the same experience with the wizard as Elara and Harriet, she recognized enough of Professor Snape's character to understand he was not careless enough to leave his stores open, or his office unattended. _Careless_ was perhaps the very last word Hermione would use in describing the Potions Master—right alongside _forgiving_ , _kind_ , or _merciful._

 _"_ What do you expect us to do, then? Hex him?"

"Oh, nothing that drastic, Harriet. Really."

Elara made a thoughtful noise, a furrow forming between her dark brows as Hermione watched her think. "I believe…I have an idea."

Harriet perked up. "Yeah?"

"Yes." She smiled the kind of narrow, secretive smile that both worried and filled Hermione with anticipation. "I think I fancy a bit of run…."

 **x**

Three days later, the morning dawned cool and gray, thick mist crawling over the grounds from the lake's shores to lay heavy and indolent against the grass. Bird calls echoed in the Forbidden Forest, the perennial, mundane avians drowned out by the louder and far more sinister Augurey cries. If one listened closely and turned their ear toward the dirt trail meandering near the tree line, the sound of three pairs of feet striking the wet earth could be heard, as could the short, asthmatic breathing of a witch very near passing out where she stood.

"We're almost there," Harriet muttered as the trio traveled along the final stretch, the cold air searing in their lungs, the main courtyard waiting just ahead. The shorter witch barely panted and had yet to break a sweat, while Hermione herself felt clammy and overheated despite the chill weather, and Elara had long since subsided into strangled wheezing. "I _really_ don't like this bloody idea."

Hermione couldn't say she much liked it either. Success pended on far too many variables—like Professor Snape's disposition, placement of the items they intended to st— _borrow_ , and whether or not he left the portrait open when he turned from it. Elara asserted the simplest plan of action would work best of all, and she wasn't _wrong_ , at least not entirely so, because they _had_ already witnessed Snape opening the storage room before. That was how Hermione saw the ingredients in the first place. They needed to replicate the situation, which was why the trio now came stumbling up toward the castle far too early in the morning with Elara half-supported by Harriet and Hermione's anxious hovering.

Professor Snape was in his office, they knew. They had checked—discreetly, or as discreetly as they could—for the past few mornings, and this was the first time they'd heard the rustle of cloth and scritch of a quill beyond the shut door. Elara tripped once they'd slipped over the entrance hall's threshold, and Harriet—being shorter and already holding much of the other girl's weight—went down in a tangle of cursing limbs.

Hermione almost cursed as well, jumping forward to drag a very pale and woozy Elara upright while Harriet jumped to her feet sporting a red mark on her chin and lopsided glasses. Footsteps echoed down the far corridor toward the main stair vault, someone undoubtedly coming down to see what all the noise was about, and so the three witches scrambled away from the entrance hall as fast as they could manage, plunging down into the dungeons once more.

Once they reached their destination, Harriet took the lead, sending Hermione one final, anxious look before she banged her knuckles against Snape's door. She had to knock again before it was jerked open, and the Potions Master stood looming in all his dour glory, the heavy smell of mysterious brews seeping into the corridor from the open door.

"What—," he began, voice gone quiet and cold like a knife slicing through the otherwise somber hush of the dungeons. His gaze landed on the fresh bruise forming across Harriet's chin and narrowed. "Do you think you're doing?"

"Err—."

Elara, blue in the face, started to cough, and Hermione couldn't say if she was doing so for theatrical effect or not. Snape instantly realized what had happened, of course. He hissed and grabbed the witch by her shoulder, jostling Harriet out of the way as he dragged Elara to the nearest desk and all but threw her into it. Unavoidable, but not ideal; they'd hoped she could sit at a desk farther into the room and farther from the portrait, but there was nothing they could do now. Hermione shrunk back, remaining as quiet as could while Elara gasped and Harriet, standing against Snape's shelves, eased her weight from one nervous foot to the other.

The portrait had changed. Where the serpent charmer once played now hung a painting of a quiet library, a single bearded wizard dozing at a reading desk while books flickered by over his head and a candle guttered in the resulting breeze. Hermione didn't have long to consider the change before Snape slammed the portrait open, ducked into the storeroom, and returned holding a vial and a shorter, opaque canister. He dropped both onto the desk next to Elara, and slowly Hermione edged toward the open storage room. She could barely think over the roar of blood in her ears.

"What did I tell you?" Professor Snape barked at Elara as he grabbed her hand and twisted it, studying the bluish tinge staining her nail beds. "I assumed I had used small enough words when I told you _not_ to overexert yourself, Black! Did I overestimate your vocabulary, or just your own self-awareness?"

"Too cold," Elara choked out. "It's too cold. It made it—worse. Worse than normal."

Hermione's heart raced in her chest as she stepped into the storage room, torn between watching Professor Snape's back and searching for the necessary ingredients. In a rush, she had a moment of doubt; what were they doing? This was so, so foolish. She was terrified of what was happening with this Heir of Slytherin nonsense—but Elara had induced her own asthma attack, for goodness' sake! They knew help was only a few minutes away, but still! What if they hadn't have gotten back to the castle in time? What if they were delayed? What if she'd really hurt herself?

Hermione's hands shook as she found the basket of bicorn horns and quickly grabbed one.

Professor Snape had the orange potion vial pinched between his thumb and forefingers as he held it out to Elara, who hesitated, visibly trying not to glance over the wizard's shoulder in Hermione's direction. " _Black_ —."

They were running out of time. Oh, Hermione hadn't considered how quickly everything would pass once they got inside the office, every second seeming to come faster than the one before as she scanned the shelves in search of his boomslang skin. The professor had very few labels, and if he had a system of organization, Hermione couldn't decipher it. All her knowledge of potions seemed to ooze from her ears and she couldn't recognize anything at all. The names of everything blurred in her head.

 _How does he find anything?!_

The bicorn horn poked her ribs as Hermione stuck it inside her Muggle zip-up jacket. Elara and Snape bickered, but Elara's voice was failing her, and the Potions Master was running low on patience. Hermione's eyes flicked back and forth over the shelves, searching, panic building as she failed to find anything remotely snake-like in appearance. What if he didn't have any? What if—?

 _Why doesn't he keep the skins together?! That's infuriating!_

She jumped when the now empty potion vial came sailing past her, slotting itself neatly in by other used bottles and jars sitting in a grubby tub waiting to be cleaned. _Oh no_. Hermione swallowed, knowing Snape would turn at any second, would find her standing here half-frozen with nerves—.

"Professor!" Harriet stuttered as the wizard stepped back toward the open portrait.

Snape paused and flicked loose hair from his eyes. "What is it, Potter?"

"I, uh—. I, I feel a bit—dizzy!"

"What—?"

Before the question could fully form, Harriet's legs went out from under her, and she fell hard into the shelf behind her, knocking over books and ghoulish canisters as she collapsed. Jars split and shattered on the stones, hideous smells escaping the broken glass. A loud—and surprising—yelp left Professor Snape, and he hurried to bend over the slumped witch while Hermione renewed her frantic search.

Her fingertips skated over something leathery— _there!_

Hermione yanked a folio from a shelf holding preserved specimens and found various cut and dried pieces of reptilian epidermis separated by wax dividers. There were spaces for labels on the pages, and yet Snape still didn't write the name of the skins. Hermione knew she could figure out which was which—if given enough time, and just a touch of light, and—.

Before she could reconsider, Hermione shoved the whole folio inside her jacket and did up the zip, hoping the padding disguised the irregular edges pressing into the cloth. Hands shaking again, she darted out of the storage room—almost tripping in her haste—and latched onto Elara's arm just as Professor Snape levered a disheveled Harriet upright once more.

"Merlin only knows what I did to be cursed with you three," the professor snarled, his insult clipped and rather tame for the amount of frustration evident in his harsh, lined features. He vanished the ruined glass scattered about Harriet's feet, then flicked his hand at the desk, summoning the opaque container he'd grabbed earlier.

"Sorry, sir—urgh!" Harriet complained as Professor Snape slapped a generous glob of smelly gel onto the witch's bruised face.

"Rub that in," he barked as he screwed the lid back into place and checked on Elara. His black eyes flickered over Hermione and narrowed, then moved to Harriet, who gave him an angry look as she smeared bruise cream off her chin. "Whatever foolishness you three intend to perpetuate at this hour stops now. You're not to use the track for the rest of the year. That includes you, Potter."

"What!"

"Ten points from Slytherin."

"Wh—? Why? We're not doin' anything wrong! It was an accident!"

Hermione's fingers clenched tighter on Elara's arm, and the folio inside her jacket suddenly felt as if it weighed a hundred stone. She had never stolen anything aside from Harriet's birthday present before—and that hardly counted. If anything, stealing from the Malfoys was a good deed, not a bad one.

"Once is an accident, twice is idiocy!" Professor Snape dismissed the bruise cream into the potions' storage and slammed the portrait closed. Hermione swallowed. He rounded his desk and sank into his chair, scowling at the three witches in turn before coming back to Harriet. "Stay inside the castle."

"What about Quidditch, _sir_?" Harriet retorted, nose in the air. Hermione and Elara elected to slowly edge toward the door. "And Herbology? Should we stay inside the castle then, too?"

"That's another ten points, girl."

 _"Harriet_ ," Hermione hissed when she opened her mouth to reply. "Let's go."

"Listen to your interfering friend, Potter, before you further aggravate me." Professor Snape sneered and leaned upon his arm. "Get out of my office. All of you—and next time, faint in the Transfiguration corridor so you become Minerva's problem, not mine."

The three witches did as told, and they didn't miss how loud the door was when it slammed shut at their backsides, the sound echoing deeper into the dungeons' confines. "Why did you antagonize him?" Hermione demanded as she dropped Elara's arm. "He's going to be furious enough when he realizes he's missing ingredients!"

"Because if he's brassed off with me, then he won't be thinking about what you were doing while we were in the office," Harriet muttered in reply. "Ugh, I think I stepped in dead squid or something. That's disgusting."

They continued until they reached the entrance to the dorms, at which point Elara—breathing normally but still somewhat pale and sweaty—stopped and said, "I'm going to go lie down."

"Oh, Elara, do you need anything? Are you all right? I know this was your plan, but—."

The taller witch shook her head, forestalling Hermione's well-meaning diatribe. She dragged a hand across her brow and swept back the few untidy strands stuck to her skin. "I understood perfectly well what I was doing, Hermione—and I won't be in a rush to do it again, I assure you. I'm fine now. Go, hurry before Snape or Slytherin catches you loitering about."

They parted ways, Hermione and Harriet leaving the dungeons back toward the entrance hall. Other students were up and about at this hour, but not many, mostly studious older years or Quidditch players like Harriet heading out to practice on the pitch, so the two Slytherin witches kept their heads down and hoped they wouldn't be noticed by any professors. Harriet wished aloud for her Invisibility Cloak, and Hermione agreed that even if Professor Snape could see through it somehow, the _other_ teachers couldn't. Stewing lacewing flies wasn't illegal, but embarking on the next part of the potion would be; the Cloak could prove invaluable for discretion.

Water dripped somewhere in the loo when they entered, echoing in the vacant confines, morning sunshine struggling to illuminate the grungy window set high on the far wall. Hermione locked the door, then went to their commandeered stall housing the simmering potion and the spare kit she'd hidden and Charmed behind the water tank.

"You did manage to get everything, didn't you? If we have to go tell Elara we missed something, I think she might murder us in our beds."

Hermione laughed the kind of breathless, incredulous laugh she'd heard people make after waiting and stressing over an important phone call or interview or meeting. The relief came in a burst, like fizzy water in her middle, and though apprehension and fear still tingled in her limbs, Hermione felt leagues better once they'd escaped Professor Snape's vicinity. "I'm almost positive I did."

" _Almost_ positive? What does that mean?"

With a guilty shrug, Hermione unzipped her Muggle jacket and brought out the horn and the hard folio. "Well, I might have taken a bit _more_ than just the boomslang skin. I was running out of time, and the infuriating man doesn't label anything! He's hundreds of ingredients in there! Honestly, how does he remember it all? Anyway, I…panicked."

"You panicked?" Harriet's eyes grew as round as Galleons when Hermione opened the folio to display the carefully preserved sheets of snake and lizard skin. "Holy _shite_. If he figures out we took all that, Snape might _really_ expel us."

"It's not as if I can return what we're not using. I'm sure he'd find some way to trace it back to us, and at least now Professor Snape can't be certain of what we're brewing. If he discovered someone was making Polyjuice, he'd be more paranoid than usual. Ah—there!" Hermione let out another one of those relieved-beyond-words breaths as she extracted the glistening green boomslang skin from the folio and transferred it to the spare potions kit with the bicorn horn. They had everything now. The potion would be finished before they knew it.

Hermione stared into the murky water settled within cauldron's belly. She considered again the sheer absurdity of what they would attempt in just a few short weeks—the sheer absurdity of what they'd _already_ done, and Hermione felt…uncommonly blessed. She wasn't one for religion really, having always ascribed more worth to science and academic study than to legends and theocracy, but as she stood in that stuffy loo lost in her own thoughts, she pondered the possibility of a heretofore unseen deity giving her a boon—because for all the fear and uncertainty currently burdening Hogwarts, Hermione had Harriet and Elara. She had friends who were willing to steal from terrifying men like Professor Snape and risk their own health simply for her state of mind.

She didn't know what she'd done to deserve them. Bigotry plagued Salazar Slytherin's House like a particularly persistent and nasty case of boils, but how bad could the wizard have been if the Sorting Hat imbued with a part of his personage looked into the heads of people like Elara and Harriet and decided they belonged there?

"Hermione?"

"Hmm?"

"We should probably return to the dungeons. Let's find Elara and go get some breakfast."

"Yes, of course." Hermione closed the potions kit and Charmed it back into place behind the tank, hidden from view. She took Harriet's hand in her own and, smiling, said, "Let's go."

* * *

 **A/N: Breaking News - Three tiny witches rob poor, unsuspecting Potions Master blind. More at eleven.**

 **Also, this fic has over 1k followers now. That's amazing! I hope you're enjoying the story!**


	75. like the storm

**_lxxv. like the storm_**

Even hours after the game ended, Harriet could still feel the gentle struggles of the Snitch's golden wings fluttering against her palm.

Slytherin's second Quidditch match passed with little ceremony. In comparison to the bigger issues circulating inside the school, Quidditch seemed a small thing—at least for Harriet and her friends. Perhaps others still felt the tension and the rivalry, but for Harriet, the match barely sparked any of that nervous, twitchy energy she'd experienced before her first game, and she hadn't been anxious until she'd dragged her uniform on and found herself standing with her giant teammates on the pitch.

Really, the match hadn't been much at all, finishing before it began. Barely five minutes in, Harriet spotted the Snitch hovering by one of Ravenclaw's Beaters and snatched it up. The phantom touch of metal wings pressing into her skin reaffirmed the surreality of it all. She kept glancing at the hand, and her thumb rubbed against the side of her index finger where the feathers had left their red indents. The marks had long since faded, but Harriet swore they were still there.

"Longbottom looked particularly upset," Hermione reported after Harriet returned from changing out of her uniform in the locker room. "Almost as upset as Malfoy. You would think Draco would be _pleased_ his House's team is performing so admirably, but I believe seeing you play only reminds him that he hasn't an ounce of your skill and won't have a chance of playing next year."

Harriet snorted at the memory, her breath escaping in a plume of steam. They stood now on the covered bridge halfway between one of the courtyards and the Sundial Garden, the open ravine yawning wide below the bridge's wooden slats, the struts groaning when the breeze rose and rushed by. It made for a curious choice of meeting places, but Harriet enjoyed the bracing air and the general solitude, especially after experiencing the noise down in the common room. Sunlight reflected off the distant lake, and Harriet squinted against the light, leaning her folded arms on the crooked rail.

"Are you all right, Elara?" Hermione asked in the sudden lull. "It's a bit chilly out here. All this cold air isn't good for—."

"I'm fine," Elara replied with a put upon sigh, her colorless eyes glinting below her dark lashes. The green and silver scarf wrapped about her neck muffled her voice. "Leave off, I'm not made of glass."

Relentless, Hermione kept fussing over Elara, just as she had done without end since their successful potions ingredient caper. Snape had been furious all week, glaring at anyone and everyone with blatant suspicion welling in the bottomless black oubliettes of his eyes. "Are you sure? We can go back inside where it's warmer if you want—."

"Hermione, if you don't stop asking if I'm all right, I will pick you up and throw you off this bridge. Don't test me on this."

Harriet snickered as Hermione huffed and Elara scowled at them both. "Don't be silly. You couldn't pick me up. I'm far heavier than you."

"I'm several inches taller than you, Granger."

Sizing the pair up, Harriet said, "You're both heavy," and earned a sharp swat on the arm and a pinch to the cheek. "Ow, ow, ow—my face!"

"Don't be cheeky, then."

"You're cheeky enough for both of us—ow! I'm just having a laugh!"

Elara let go, and Harriet _did_ laugh as she rubbed her tender skin and the other witch made threatening shooing motions. They continued on their way, the bridge complaining all the while, until they stepped off onto solid ground. Crooked gray stones towered above them, eclipsing the view of the forest as they painted long, stretched shadows across the grass. The first time Harriet visited this place last year, Hermione had delighted in telling her the Stone Circle—or the Sundial Garden—was thought to be the oldest place at Hogwarts, predating the castle itself, making it an area of very old, mysterious magic.

Harriet just thought it was a nice place to linger, barring any irate Potions Masters who might come by, shrieking at them to go back to the castle. She shivered, and it had nothing to do with the cold. _If he ever figures out it was us, he'll chuck all three of us into that ravine there and make it look like an accident._

"You know, Harriet," Hermione commented as she perched on a large bit of rock protruding from the earth. Harriet sat next to her—then saw there wasn't anywhere else nearby to sit, so she slid to the damp grass and gave up the spot to Elara. "I thought you enjoyed the party they threw after the last Quidditch match. Why were you so eager to get away this time?"

Shrugging, Harriet replied, "I liked it well enough before Malfoy broke my sodding nose. And, I dunno, the—the upper-years get loud. I can't say I like that very much." What Harriet didn't say was that the pissed sixth and seventh years started sounding as loud and belligerent as her Aunt and Uncle, and though she knew the comparison was ridiculous, she still felt…uncomfortable around them. "I like Quidditch for the flying more than anything. It's amazing!"

Hermione and Elara wore matching incredulous expressions as they looked down at Harriet.

"It's like—everything else disappears once I'm in the air, I'm weightless and floating and—peaceful." Sighing, Harriet turned her back, getting mud on her socks, and leaned on Hermione's legs, nudging Elara's feet over. She could see the lake better from here, a thin trickle of smoke rising where Hagrid's hut sat just out of sight. "It was nice to fly, considering how stressed Potions had me this week. I wish the match had been longer."

Hermione's hand settled on Harriet's head and gave an idle attempt at flattening the rogue cowlicks. "You needn't worry so much. He won't know it was us, Harriet. I left the folio with most of the samples in the staff room, so either another professor took it, or he found it and has to assume one of the other teachers borrowed from him without asking. Either way, someone's going to be caught red-handed, or he'll have to interrogate professors—and I can't see Professor Snape wanting to bother with that, honestly."

"Hmm," Harriet acknowledged, fidgeting. It was a clever bit of misdirection on Hermione's part, and it hadn't even been difficult, considering she went to the staff room all the time to ask professors questions about lectures or homework assignments. Still, in her own thoughts, Harriet admitted stealing from Snape didn't sit well with her. If it had been some other bloke, she probably wouldn't have minded as much and certainly wouldn't have dwelt on the issue. Undeniably, Snape was a git of the highest order—but he was a git who looked out for the Slytherins and had healed Elara twice. Taking his things seemed a shite way to repay the wizard.

A sudden, soft _thump_ startled Harriet and she looked around, frowning at a familiar raven hopping by her knee, its leg extended to hold out the tied off twine. " _Harriet Potter_ ," it croaked.

Seeing the bird, Hermione brightened—and almost kicked Harriet in the spine. "Oh! Were you expecting another letter from Nicolas Flamel?"

"Mhm." Harriet freed the raven of its burden, and it clicked its beak as if expecting a reward—then squawked in dismay when Harriet showed it empty hands. The raven vanished in a puff of smoke, leaving Harriet to readjust her glasses and inspect her letter. She recognized Mr. Flamel's sprawling copperplate right away.

 _Chère Harriet,_

 _I hope this letter finds you safe, well, and warm in Poudlard's frozen mountains. It is with no little amount of smugness that I tell you I am writing in the gardens, thoroughly enjoying the sunshine and the lingering late autumn blooms. My Perenelle tells me I should not be so pleased with myself, but I have always thought it healthy to inspire a spot of envy in others now and again. What is life if we do not enjoy what we have, non?_

 _I have heard of the difficulties happening at the school, and again hope you and yours are staying safe and out of mischief. In your last letter, you asked if I knew anything of this Chambre des Secrets, and I cannot say I know more than you must at this point, petit oiseau. I am not an Englishman and did not attend Poudlard, but I do remember first hearing about this Chambre in the forties—the nineteen-forties. A student died, and the shock of the loss resonated even in France. I could not say what it is or what happened; I will not hazard a guess, for though I may know many things, there is much that I do not and cannot understand. Poudlard is old—older than me! Quite an accomplishment—and the witches and wizards alive during its creation were different creatures. You ask if I believe it possible Salazar Slytherin left a monster or curse within this Chambre of his? Oui. Do I think he left such a thing to kill Demoyennes? Non. A wise witch once said, "Magique is but an extension of your arm, and you cannot hold that what you cannot reach." If you would indulge my rambling, understand that I say whatever Salazar Slytherin's motivations, be they bigoted or not, he was said to be a very smart and calculating man; leaving behind something that he could not control, that lay outside his reach, something that could potentially destroy Poudlard, his true legacy? Non. I do not believe it._

 _On a lighter topic, the questions you pose on Birch's Law are complicated ones. You will find that the theories they teach in your lessons become more malleable once you experience magic outside of the classroom for yourself. This Prof. Slytherin is—. How do you say? A different story? Dangereux, Harriet. Moyenne science teaches how certain, inarguable facts of nature cannot be changed, but for us, magique is not so fixed. It bends to emotion. It is chaotic. Like the storm—beautiful, oui, but often unpredictable, and we could study it for a million years and still find ourselves surprised. Modern spellcraft arose from a need to create fixed incantations with measurable, constant results, but when I was a boy, magique was a primal thing, and my professeurs taught it was a skill more of the heart than of the mind. What is possible for one wizard may not be possible for another. But I am rambling again. I have some lovely texts on the subject I will have to dig out of the library and send to you._

 _Be safe, and careful. Your Defense Master is more than he appears._

 _Jusqu'à la prochaine fois, petit oiseau,_

 _Nicolas Flamel._

 _Well, then._ "Hermione? What's _petit oi—? Ois—?_ " Harriet grumbled and spelled the word out one letter at a time. "What's that mean?"

The bushy-haired witch had a funny look on her face, and when Harriet twisted in place to see her, the corners of her lips jumped, repressing a grin. "It means ' _little bird_.'"

Harriet scowled, pink tinging her cheeks, and Hermione started laughing. Elara buried her own smile in her scarf.

"Yeah, yeah, very funny." The bespectacled witch scanned through the letter again, then handed it off to her friends, Hermione and Elara putting their heads together to read it at the same time.

"Interesting. What did you write to him about?"

"I dunno specifically. I asked him a bunch of questions about _Un Guide Sur la Connaissance des Ténèbres,_ you know that book you translated for me? And then I asked about the spell Professor Slytherin used, how he managed to get it to bounce when I couldn't. I also asked about the Chamber, but I didn't know he didn't attend Hogwarts—or _Poudlard_. What does that even mean?"

"It's what the French call Hogwarts."

"Where d'you think Mr. Flamel went to school, then?"

"Oh, it's well-known he went to the _Académie de Magie Beauxbâtons._ He's undoubtedly the reason the school is purported as the richest magic school, as he's its biggest patron."

Harriet hummed in answer.

"It appears he knows something about Professor Slytherin but isn't willing or _can't_ say more," Elara pointed out, easing the parchment from Hermione's hand before folding it and returning the letter to Harriet.

"It's probably because of Dumbledore."

"Dumbledore?"

"Yeah. He knows I write Mr. Flamel, so the Headmaster probably asked him not to mention something about Slytherin." Harriet traced a finger over the creases pressed into the parchment, wondering what the alchemist meant by calling Professor Slytherin _dangerous_. She knew he was dangerous, abstractly at least, and she'd suffered from more than a few bruises at the end of his wand. She didn't think that was what Mr. Flamel wanted to warn her against, however.

" _Master_ Flamel."

Harriet blinked. "What?"

" _Master_ Flamel, Harriet, not _Mister_. That's his proper title."

"Well, he hasn't corrected me in any of the letters he's sent," the younger witch replied, frustrated. Arguing semantics over a wizard's title wasn't important to Harriet, and she couldn't help the niggling lump of disappointment from turning over in her middle. She'd hoped he would shed more light on the Chamber and whatever it contained. Harriet and the others already knew the Chamber had been opened before; Professor Selwyn had said as much in History of Magic, but Harriet hadn't known someone died last time. Who had it been? How did it happen? Did they die because of the Petrification?

Footsteps echoed in the covered bridge and brought an end to their musings. The three witches waited, watching, and grimaced in triplicate when Neville Longbottom came tromping out into the open with Seamus and two older students Harriet didn't know. "He's worse than Malfoy," she muttered, despising whatever miserable fates conspired to continually cross their paths. She could very happily go the rest of her life never without ever seeing the Boy Who Lived again.

It only took a few seconds for the Gryffindors to spot them, and they froze as if they'd discovered actual snakes on the lawn and not just three young Slytherin witches sitting on a rock. "What are you doing here?"

"What does it look like, Longbottom?" Harriet retorted, biting her tongue to keep her tone even. "We're sitting here."

The taller, dark-haired Gryffindor said something to his friend, and they guffawed, an unfriendly tilt taking over their grins as they faced the younger witches again. "You know them, Neville?"

Longbottom hesitated, then gave his shoulder a lazy jerk as if fully shrugging would take too much effort. "Sure. They're in my year."

"So you don't _know_ them," said the other older student. He had a heavy dusting of freckles over his cheeks and nose. "I mean you can't _really_ know Slytherins, can you? Right, Finnigan?"

"Yeah," Seamus agreed. He and Neville looked at one another, then at the ground.

"Oi." The tallest Gryffindor approached, one hand on his hip, the other twirling his wand between his long fingers. "What are you little snakes up to, huh?"

Harriet eyed the wand and, though her hand itched for her own, she didn't remove it from its brace. Snape's warnings and reprimands bounced inside her thick skull, telling her it'd be worse if she reacted, because if that Gryffindor prat tried to hex her and she used a shield, it'd probably smack bloody Longbottom square in the face. It'd look like Harriet had attacked him, and she'd land herself in detention for a month—or worse.

"I think they're collaborating, aren't they, Rivers?" said the second Gryffindor, elbowing Longbottom as if looking for approval. "Are you out here waiting for your Heir to show himself?"

"What hogwash," Hermione snapped. Harriet bit her lip and Elara kept her face perfectly blank, though Harriet noticed how tightly she held her hands. "Just because we're Slytherins doesn't mean we have anything to do with this Heir nonsense. _I'm_ Muggle-born."

"But you're not lying up in Pomfrey's ward like poor Creevey, snake," the one named Rivers snapped. "Isn't that _convenient_ —and here you are, having a nice chin wag with Slytherin's cheating little _Seeker_. What'd you do to the Snitch, Potter? D'you have to Jinx it because you can't see with those nasty specs of yours? "

The freckled Gryffindor took out his wand, giving it an arrogant twirl. "What've you got there? _Relashio!_ " Purple light flickered over her, and suddenly the parchment in Harriet's hand slipped through her numb fingers, falling to the grass. She tried to catch it, but another flick of the senior's wand sent the letter flying right into the boy's large fist. Harriet jumped after it.

"That's mine!"

The freckled boy held the letter high, away from Harriet's grasping hands, and she barely suppressed the urge to kick him in the shin. "Is it? Is it from your mummy, little girl? Huh?"

Heat prickled in her chest, in her neck, and though Harriet knew her face had gone quite pink, she didn't back down. She wanted to hex him. She wanted—. "Give me my letter, or I'll tell Professor Slytherin."

"You wouldn't, Potter," Longbottom said, crossing his arms, though he shot an uneasy look at his older friends and didn't sound at all sure of himself.

"I would—I _will,_ " she asserted, making another jump for the letter, only for the freckled Gryffindor to push her back and hold it higher. "Stop it!"

Hermione got to her feet with Elara. "Give it here, Wattle!" she said, and Harriet wasn't at all surprised she knew the prat's surname. "Harriet's letter is no one's business but her own!"

Harriet grabbed Wattle's sleeve, trying to yank his arm down, and he pushed her again, hard enough for Harriet to stumble.

"What's going on 'ere?"

The commotion hid the approach of thumping feet shuffling nearer from the forest, and the students looked up to see Hagrid—dressed in his hairy coat, balancing a crossbow on his shoulder with a dead rooster in his hand—standing off by one of the sundial's crooked stones. The disapproving look on his lined face showed that he very clearly knew exactly what was going on, but that didn't stop the Gryffindors from lying through their teeth.

"Oh, hey, Hagrid," said Rivers, stashing his wand away in his pocket. "These Slytherins were acting suspicious, and given what's been happening, we were just having a chat is all."

"That's a load of hippogriff dung and you know it, Rivers. Go on, give Harry her letter there and get yerselves back to the castle. Go on!"

Frowning, Wattle let the letter go, and Harriet managed to grab it before it could land in the mud. The Gryffindors shuffled off, Wattle and Rivers disappointed and put out, Longbottom and Finnigan clearly relieved. Harriet didn't care if they were relieved; they stood by and did nothing, and would've continued to stand by and do nothing while the older boys pushed Harriet around and took her things. Harriet really hated them in that moment—them _and_ Professor Snape, because she wanted nothing more than to curse them blue as they walked away, consequences be damned.

"All right there, Harry?" asked Hagrid.

"Yes," she replied, because she wasn't hurt, even if she was upset and felt tears burning the corners of her eyes. Harriet decided those tears were just as stupid as Wattle and Rivers and refused to let them fall, scrunching her nose until the sting abated. "I'm okay. Thanks, Hagrid."

The half-giant nodded, shifting his crossbow, the bloody rooster swaying in his grip. "They don't mean nothin' by it, course. They're good lads usually—but fear makes people do dumb things."

Perhaps sensing Harriet's urge to snap at the man, Hermione piped up with, "What happened to your rooster, Hagrid?" which spared Harriet from saying anything she might regret.

"Oh, er—nothin', nothin'. At least, nothin' for you lot to concern yerselves with." Hagrid quickly tucked the rooster in one of his large pockets and wiped the bloody feathers from his fingers. "C'mon, you three, best be gettin' back inside now. It's a mite cold to be out here without yer coats."

Harriet didn't believe Hagrid really cared about them getting chilled, but she nonetheless allowed herself to be herded back across the covered bridge with her friends, Mr. Flamel's letter still clasped in her small hands, her fingers worrying the edges until the crisp parchment felt soft and old.

She would never understand why people hated Slytherins. Some said it was because of the Dark Lord, because he went to Hogwarts and he was in the House of Serpents, but what did his Sorting have to do with anything? Harriet was a Slytherin, and she'd lost almost everything because of Voldemort! She hated him, hated that he'd taken her parents, hated that he'd tempted her in front of the Mirror of Erised, and hated that every bad thing that happened at Hogwarts got turned around on Slytherin House because the Dark Lord once slept in their bloody dorms.

The letter crinkled against her palms as her fingers squeezed together.

Something Mr. Flamel wrote stuck in her mind like a thorn she couldn't quite pluck. Everyone claimed Salazar Slytherin left something in his Chamber capable of killing Muggle-borns, but Mr. Flamel didn't think so; he didn't believe the founder would endanger the school and his own legacy by potentially allowing a deadly curse or beast to be recklessly unleashed. Mr. Flamel was one of the smartest people Harriet had ever met, so she didn't dismiss what he'd said—but if Salazar Slytherin hadn't bequeathed his Heir a monster capable of Petrifying Muggle-borns, what _did_ he leave behind? What was the point of his Chamber if not to eradicate the "unworthy"?

The castle waited ahead of them. Harriet stared toward the lights visible through the bridge's crooked arches and wondered at the mystery—and danger—of it all.

* * *

A **/N: I dislike the term "Non-Magique," which is the canon French equivalent of "Muggle." So I use the term "Moyenne" instead, from the French word for "average," and "Demoyenne" is the equivalent for "Muggle-born." You can always assume it's the older version of "Non-Magique," if you want.**


	76. cleansing

**_lxxvi. cleansing_**

Three days before term ended, first-year Aidan Shafiq came running over to Harriet and Elara in the common room and shoved a note with dreaded, spidery writing into Harriet's open hand.

 _You and Black are to report to my office directly after dinner._

 _\- Prof. S. Snape_

That was not good news at all. "Shite," Harriet whispered, color leaching from her face.

"What is it?"

She handed the parchment to Elara, who didn't pale as Harriet did, but certainly looked disconcerted by the summons.

"D'you think he knows?" Harriet whispered, eyes darting about the crowded common room. No one paid them any mind, and Harriet didn't think the older students chatting around the main hearth truly realized she and Elara were there. Discussions about the upcoming break were loud and numerous.

"I think if he knew," Elara began carefully, gathering their school books together. "He would have dragged us out of here by our ears in a high temper, don't you agree?"

"…probably." Harriet cleaned her quill and capped the inkwell. "Dinner's soon, isn't it?"

"Yes. Come on, let's find Hermione…."

After sorting their things away into their school bags, the two witches went in search of their friend, but they didn't manage to find her until they reached the Great Hall, and by that point, Hermione was deep in conversation with Malfoy. Given the look on her face, Harriet didn't think it was a nice conversation. She continued to argue with the prat throughout dinner, until it was time for Harriet and Elara to drag their unwilling feet back to the dungeons, walking the too familiar path to Snape's office.

The Potions Master hadn't been at dinner, and seeing the light peeking over the threshold, Harriet knew he had to be inside. Glum, she rapped her knuckles against the wood, and a moment later a spell opened the way, revealing Snape seated behind his desk, his attention on his marking. Harriet and Elara shuffled inside—and the door slammed shut. Harriet tried very hard not to look at the portrait hiding the storage cupboard.

"Sit," Snape said, and the two witches did as bid, taking the two straight-backed chairs by the desk. Harriet sniffed and picked up the lingering smell of food, so she guessed Snape had eaten his meal down here with his work. He continued writing, scribbling what was probably a vicious reprimand on some poor sod's essay, then he set the quill aside, favoring Harriet and Elara with a blank, hard look.

"I received the list of Slytherin students intending to stay during the Yule holiday. Neither of you wrote your names down."

Harriet glanced at Elara, puzzled, and said, "…Yes? Sir?"

"Had either of you thought to _ask,_ I could have informed you that you will _not_ be leaving the school for the holiday. You will need to add your names to the list."

Elara balked. "You can't tell me where to go. Sir." She added the last bit when Snape's glower landed on her, as the wizard didn't seem in a mood to be trifled with. The cold settled in without reservation in the dungeons, and Snape's fire smoldered low. Harriet thought she might start shivering soon. "I'm—."

"If the next word out of your mouth is _emancipated_ , Black, I'll ensure you're on the train home and don't get a ticket back." Snape braced his hands on the desk's edge and stood, leaning forward, his eyes dark and grim as Harriet had ever seen them. "I cannot leave the castle during the break, and as the headmaster has seen fit to leave me in charge of your well-being while you're interred at Grimmauld Place, you will be spending Yule at Hogwarts, Potter. End of story."

There wasn't much to say after that. Neither Harriet nor Elara could change the wizard's mind, given it wasn't _Snape's_ mind that needed to be changed, rather Dumbledore's, who Harriet didn't want to bother with something so trivial. Elara wore a peeved expression as they made their way to the dormitories once again, spooking two Hufflepuff first-years who'd wandered down the Slytherin corridor.

"I think that's the Hufflepuff I blasted at the Dueling Club," Harriet muttered, chagrined. "Are you gonna stay at Hogwarts for Yule, then? Or are you going home?"

"Yes," Elara said at last, a muscle in her jaw ticking. "I'm staying, that is. I don't much _want_ to go home, or see Kreacher—but I did have a few things I wanted to research and look into."

"You don't have to stay just for me, y'know," Harriet told her, looking down at her shoes. "Last Christm—Yule wasn't so bad on my own." Really, it'd been awful, as Harriet had been stuck in detention almost every day and Elara and Hermione both knew that, but she didn't remind her.

"No, I'm staying. Snape just aggravates me."

"He aggravates everyone, that's his natural state of being."

They went to the dorms, then doubled back when they failed to find Hermione, though Harriet stopped to smuggle Livi out under her shirt. Elara tutted, but said nothing else. They went off in search of the library and took a wrong turn somewhere on the second level, where the halls sometimes liked to intermingle or pretend to be somewhere they're not, and they wandered past a familiar, faceless bust asking funny questions. "Here," Harriet said when she spotted a portrait containing a gaggle of geese. "I know the way from here."

They went around the long way, and they did find Hermione and the library eventually, the former at their favored table near the back, grumbling darkly into a thick book about Charms. A thin monograph tried creeping away from her, but Hermione smacked her palm down flat on the little booklet, and it whined.

"What were you arguing with Malfoy about?" Harriet asked.

"Never you mind," Hermione quipped—and realizing she'd snapped at the younger witch—she lowered the dusty book and grimaced. "I'm sorry, Harriet, I didn't mean that. He's—absolutely impossible, if you must know. I told him I'm going to be spending the hols with my parents, and he keeps telling me how terribly insulting it is to Lucius and Narcissa that I refuse their invitation to their Yule celebrations."

Elara rolled her eyes as she sunk into a chair. "Heaven forbid _Lucius and Narcissa_ be insulted."

Hermione scowled, shutting the book hard enough for the binding to give a warning yelp. "You don't understand," she insisted. "My place at Hogwarts isn't as secure as yours or Harriet's! If they so chose, Mr. and Mrs. Malfoy could have me removed from school—or transfer me to a different family, who might not let me go to Hogwarts at all, or I might be expelled from the Wizarding community altogether—."

"All right," Elara said, placing a placating hand on Hermione's arm. "All right, I get it. That's not going to happen."

Hermione gave her a dubious look, and Harriet pretended she couldn't see the faint gleam of tears highlighted by the Charmed candles.

"Even the Malfoy family understands the importance of family, Hermione. They won't begrudge you your time with them."

A tense moment passed between the trio as Hermione sniffled and quickly dabbed her nose with a handkerchief found in her robe pocket. "I'm being silly, I know. I—I love my parents very much, you see, but…but sometimes I—." The handkerchief turned into a wadded up mess, balled between Hermione's nervous, fidgeting hands. "Last Christmas was…was difficult. They're very sensible people, my parents, and magic can so often be…."

"Insensible?" Harriet supplied.

"Exactly." Sighing, Hermione shoved the handkerchief away into her pocket once more. "They don't understand it, and it's not their fault—but it's all very frustrating. Oh, never mind. Don't listen to me. Tell me; where did you two head off to after dinner?"

Scowling, Elara crossed her arms and looked out the window, leaving Harriet to explain their meeting with the Potions Master. Hermione was sympathetic—and then got a curious, speculative glint in her eyes, and started tapping her chin with her index finger. Harriet knew that look, and she felt a mite nervous to ask what the older witch was thinking about.

"The potion," Hermione said, still tapping at her chin, a loose curl bobbing by her hand. In the distance, Harriet could hear Madam Pince moving about, shelving books and shooing students off to bed, and she knew they needed to get back to the dorms soon or risk Professor Slytherin's wrath. "This might be a blessing, really. The potion's going to mature near Chris—Yule. It would hold fine until we returned in the New Year, but its efficacy would go down, and there'd be a much higher risk of something happening to the cauldron or the potion being contaminated without one of us coming by to properly check." Hermione stared at Harriet as she spoke. "But if you lot are staying, _you_ can finish it, Harriet."

" _Me_?" she sputtered. "I couldn't do that!"

"You're perfectly capable."

"I'd make a mess of it!"

"No, you _wouldn't_ ," Hermione asserted. "You're much better at Potions than you let yourself believe, Harriet. Besides, the most difficult aspects of the brewing process are over. You need only wait for it to mature, fold in the bicorn horn with the proper number of stirs, and then simmer."

Groaning, Harriet looked to Elara for assistance—but the other girl shook her head. "I'm not touching it."

"And if I bollocks it up?" She hadn't touched a potion nearly as complicated as Polyjuice before. Sometimes she diced ingredients for Hermione or checked the cauldron's temperature, but she never worked with the concoction itself. The bespectacled witch rubbed nervously at Livi's scales through her shirt. "What then?"

"Really, Harriet, the language—if you make a mistake, then so be it. I'm not infallible either, you know. This will be the perfect opportunity; without a lot of students about, the staff will be easier to watch and less on guard."

Elara nodded, obviously seeing the sense in Hermione's idea—but Harriet didn't nod, because it sounded terribly nerve-wracking to the poor girl, who had very little faith in her potion-brewing abilities, or her espionage skills. She wrinkled her nose, face scrunched, and as Hermione and Elara started picking up texts to return them to their proper place, Harriet left the pair there and headed back to the dormitory on her own. Her friends gave her far too much credibility. She just _knew_ she was going to ruin it. Harriet wasn't nearly as talented as Hermione, and Polyjuice was devilishly tricky.

She had traversed only a single corridor when Livi stirred, dry scales rasping against her skin. Harriet paused to soothe the serpent—when a heinous, all too familiar hissing reached her ears.

" _Time to kill…kill…mussst find them…kill them…._ "

A loud chime burst from Livius, and Harriet gasped, startled by the noise, throwing herself against the wall.

" _Kill…kill…KILL…._ "

 _Oh, Merlin,_ Harriet thought, breathing hard. _Merlin, it's here with me, it has to be here somewhere_ —. Her eyes darted all about, searching for something, _anything_ , and yet nothing in the dark hall had changed at all. The torches continued to flicker, and the sole portrait on the wall opposite her kept on with his nap. Harriet had to find a professor—or Lockhart, or _someone_! But where to go? Where would they be? What was she to do?

Livi chimed again and hissed with menace, having slithered out of Harriet's collar to perch half his body on her shoulder. " _I will bitesss it,_ " the Horned Serpent declared. " _It will not come near Misstresss, I will eatsss it_ —."

" _Kill…kill the filthy onesss_ …."

Like a sudden ice bath, Harriet realized there was one Muggle-born witch near there, just one corridor over—one witch that the invisible, skulking monster might mean to kill that evening. Harriet hadn't the faintest idea where the ruddy thing was or where she could find a professor, but she knew _exactly_ where Hermione and Elara were; in the library, defenseless, unable to hear that murderous crooning closing in.

She took off running, not caring that the hissing faded, that Livius coiled too tightly about her throat, or that she must look like a madman running through the hall. Her heart raced. She had her wand in her hand, and she didn't remember taking it out. Harriet didn't care about any of that; all she cared about was finding her friends and getting the hell away from there.

Harriet rounded the corner—and tripped. Something heavy and solid struck her shins, and the bespectacled witch toppled, barely managing to catch herself with her hands before she collided with the floor. Livi writhed but Harriet's reflexes spared him from impact, even if she did bloody her knees from the effort. Panting, Harriet rolled to see what she'd hit—and froze.

A ghost hovered in the corridor. Pearlescent and as gray as a winter morning, he drifted several inches from the stones below, and Set pooled around him in a vaporous black veil, a haunting halo of shadow and inky darkness in the encroaching hours of night. Harriet knew the ghost to be Nearly Headless Nick, though she hadn't any familiarity with him; she didn't know any of the undead residents of the castle, and this was the closest she'd ever been to one. Nick hung motionless in the air, staring straight ahead.

There was something behind him, something large, crumpled by the wall. Something shaped like a body….

Hands landed on Harriet's shoulders. Her heart leapt into her throat and she shrieked, terrified—only to look up into the black eyes of Professor Snape as he knelt by her, out of breath, his hair wind-blown as if he'd ran the width of the castle.

"Are you injured?" he demanded. "Are you hurt, Miss Potter?"

"Wh-what?!"

"Are you _hurt_ , you imbecile?!"

Harriet gave her head a jerk to the side, certain she wouldn't be able to find her voice. Together, they turned to the gruesome sight before them, seeing the student sprawled upon the floor, the paralyzed Gryffindor ghost, and the glistening letters scrawled by an errant, irreverent hand upon the stone wall.

 _SLYTHERIN'S HEIR WILL CLEANSE THE DIRTY-BLOODED._

Harriet gulped.

* * *

 **A/N: Livius - "I'll eat it!"**

 ***Basilisk appears, 50 feet long, big as a bus.***

 **Livius, narrowing eyes - "I'm still gonna eat it _._ "**


	77. burning day

**_lxxvii. burning day_**

The boy was named Justin Finch-Fletchley, and when Snape rolled him to his back, exposing his face, Harriet knew he was Petrified before the wizard could say a word.

She couldn't look away from him, even as she shook, still sitting on the cold floor with a sluggish trickle of blood dripping from her knee into her rumpled sock. Harriet could have been the one attacked—Harriet or Hermione or Elara, or any of the few students meandering about the library, since that was where Justin must have come from. She couldn't understand how it had happened, and so quickly. _It could have been me._

When McGonagall came upon them, she spotted Justin and gave a muffled shout—and then shouted again when she spied Harriet and the agitated serpent wriggling about her neck. "Miss _Potter_ —!"

"Minerva, take Potter to the Headmaster," Snape said, using his wand to levitate Justin into the air. The Potions Master looked ghastly in the dim light, pale with shock, right hand twitching. There was sweat on his brow.

"What?! Severus, there is a _snake_ —!"

"Now is not the time or the place, woman! Quickly, before Slytherin comes strutting by, get her away from here!"

McGonagall didn't appreciate being ordered about, but she urged Harriet to her feet, staying as far from the hissing snake as was possible in the hall's confines. Snape's mention of Slytherin spurred Harriet onward, though she did so in a daze, the image of Nearly Headless Nick and Finch-Fletchley burned in her mind. What in the _world_ could Petrify someone who was _already dead?_ And the writing on the wall—! Was that another threat against Professor Slytherin?

Livius continued to spit and threaten the invisible voice, and Harriet would've been very flattered at his chivalry if the snake didn't threaten to bite and eat anyone and everything for every minor inconvenience he incurred. " _Shut up, Livi_ ," Harriet whispered as she tried to wrestle him back into her shirt, but the others had been right when they said he was getting too large, and she had barely grown at all. Professor McGonagall continued to goggle at her, stunned into silence.

"He's my familiar, Professor," Harriet explained.

"Your _familiar_?"

"Yeah—I mean, yes, ma'am." She succeeded in calming Livi enough for him to go invisible once more, earning a startled huff from the Transfiguration professor. "The Headmaster and Professor Snape know about him."

"Oh, I'm sure they do, Miss Potter," Professor McGonagall said, her brogue thick and agitated, and she uttered something else in an undertone, but Harriet didn't quite hear it.

They hurried on, Harriet struggling to keep pace with her shorter legs and her knee stinging terribly by the time they reached the seventh floor and the entrance to Dumbledore's office. McGonagall gave the password— "Gobbling gumdrops," —and then shooed Harriet up the spiraling steps without her. "Stay in the office, Harriet, until Professor Dumbledore finds you," the witch instructed, disappearing before Harriet could ask anything else. She realized the professor had called her by name, and though the thought warmed Harriet and told her Professor McGonagall didn't believe she'd attacked Justin, little could displace the sudden chill sitting in her middle.

The office hadn't changed a bit since she'd seen it at Hallowe'en, the door to the closet where Quirrell met his end still sealed tight, the mullioned windows giving a glimpse of the sunset's final vestiges smeared on the horizon like a bloody fingerprint. Most of the headmasters and headmistresses snoozed in their frames, but a few watched curiously as the young witch came edging in the room, uncertain of herself.

"Professor Dumbledore?" Harriet said aloud—but no, Professor McGonagall mentioned the Headmaster would come to find her, probably after checking on Finch-Fletchley and Nick. Sighing, Harriet went to one of the comfortable winged chairs by the hearth and sank into it, glancing at the smoldering bits of ash and wood settling in the grate.

She worried about Hermione and Elara; just because the monster had already attacked this evening _didn't_ mean it wouldn't attack again—and Elara and Hermione must have left the library by now. Were they back in the common room, safe with the others? Or were they still in the corridors? Harriet swallowed down her trepidation and prodded her knee, keeping her eyes fixed on the growing bruise and clotting scrape.

A clock chimed the hour.

There were a great many things in the Headmaster's office Harriet hadn't had the time or the wits to inspect before. Restless and in need of a distraction, she hopped to her feet and took the chance to investigate now, pacing along the wall with its wood shelves and shorter tables laden with strange devices. Harriet thought Professor Dumbledore might have more books than the library crammed into the shelves, several protected behind locked cabinet doors, and though she wondered what kind of texts a wizard like Dumbledore might collect and seal away, she didn't touch the doors.

A set of stairs led to an upper platform, an area behind the professor's large desk that held more portraits upon the curved wall, more shelves, and several shut doors. She considered going up those steps but didn't, because Harriet decided those doors must lead to Professor Dumbledore's quarters and it felt terribly rude for her to go poking her nose about where it didn't belong.

Harriet's eyes moved over the tables with their silver instruments and came to rest upon a familiar pile of glass.

She shivered when she stopped before the Mirror of Erised's fragments. Professor Dumbledore had the largest pieces floating in the air, like a bizarre, string-less Muggle mobile, shifting ever so slightly when Harriet approached and her breath caught the edges. Looking into the shards, Harriet didn't know what she expected to see—maybe nothing at all, given Quirrell had shattered the dodgy thing when he tried to kill her—but individual images moved within the fragments. She peered closer.

It took Harriet a moment to realize the mirror still worked—at least, after a fashion. Instead of displaying her single greatest desire, however, each chunk and sliver showed smaller wants and wishes, big, small, important, and petty alike. _There_ Harriet saw herself having a lie-in, and _there_ she saw her mum's face, and _here_ laid her favorite sweater with the top button fixed, and that bit over there showed all the Petrified victims back on their feet. Harriet didn't know what to look at first, and the effect was disorientating.

She still hated that mirror.

Harriet wandered back to her seat, and by the time Dumbledore arrived, the young witch was crouched near the hearth, Livius coiled on the warmed bricks and irked with her for not letting him bite the owner of the voice they'd heard in the corridor.

"Good evening," Professor Dumbledore said, smiling at her before his gaze lowered to the indignant snake. "Oh, dear. I thought we had an agreement about your familiar staying in the dorms, Harriet?"

 _Frick._ Standing, Harriet fussed with her sleeves and tried to meet his gaze, but she couldn't bring herself to look past the Headmaster's crooked nose. "I'm—sorry, Headmaster. I'm always really careful, and it's not all the time! But I—I just…feel safer when I have Livi."

Professor Dumbledore sighed, and then simply nodded, looking tired in the dying fire's dull red glow. "I understand. We will have to discuss this further at another time, but for now…."

He gestured her over to the desk and they left Livi behind, Harriet taking one of the smaller seats meant for guests and students, and Dumbledore sat next to her. The Headmaster's heavy gaze once more fixed upon Harriet, and she fidgeted in her seat. Did the Headmaster think she had something to do with Finch-Fletchley? Did anyone else know she'd been there? How did the monster move about so quickly?

"Is Justin gonna be all right?"

"Yes, thankfully. Poor boy will be back on his feet as soon as the Restorative Draught can be brewed."

"What about Nick? He got Petrified, too."

Professor Dumbledore stroked his beard in thought. "Yes, Sir Nicholas should be all right as well. Professor Snape is convinced that by reducing a sample of the Draught to a gaseous state, he'll be able to revive Gryffindor's House ghost."

The sudden image of Snape holding a spray bottle like the one Aunt Petunia used on her houseplants popped into Harriet's head and she smothered the inappropriate urge to snort.

Something about the Headmaster's demeanor bothered Harriet. All things considered, the elderly wizard seemed quite composed, a calmness about him she appreciated, but didn't understand. Why wasn't he asking about what happened, about what she saw in the corridor? Why wasn't he—?

Frowning, Harriet studied Professor Dumbledore, and he studied her too, his expression more bemused than anything, his brow raised in question. "Headmaster…." She started, pausing to gather her thoughts. "You…you know what it is, don't you, sir? The monster from the Chamber."

"Do _you_ know what it is, Harriet?"

"It's a snake," she said without hesitation, the line between her brows deepening. "I don't know what kind and we can't figure it out—but I can hear it."

A grave expression overcame Dumbledore, and he moved to touch the back of Harriet's hand. She hadn't realized she'd started gripping the armrests so tightly. "You mustn't go looking for it, Harriet. It is incredibly dangerous."

"You know what it is," she repeated. Irritation bubbled in her chest and prickled hot through her shoulder and neck. Looking in the wizard's blue eyes made her miffed all of a sudden. "I don't understand, Professor. If you know, then why—? People have gotten _hurt,_ and everyone's so frightened. Why—why isn't the school closed? Why hasn't anyone done anything? Why haven't _you_ done anything?!" Harriet took a breath and shook her head, realizing that she'd raised her voice considerably, and the portraits on the wall murmured with reproach. "I'm sorry, I don't—I didn't mean to yell, sir."

"You're well within your rights to be frustrated with me, Harriet, it's quite all right." He sighed and peered at the witch over his half-moon spectacles as if looking for something. After a moment, he gave his head a slight shake and looked away. "I fear that sometimes the easiest solutions are not all they appear."

"What d'you mean?"

"I merely wish to explain that, were it my decision, I would close the school until the danger is corrected, but it isn't my decision. A Headmaster may cancel classes if needs must, but I cannot shut Hogwarts without consent from the Board of Governors."

"But then why doesn't the Board of Governors close the school? Not that I want the school to close, it's just—not safe." _Hermione's not safe._

"Ah, Harriet. You cut to the heart of the matter, for though your question seems a simple one, it has a very complicated answer." Dumbledore said nothing else, and instead contemplated his desk and his phoenix perched upon his gilded stand. Harriet thought the bird might be molting or—ill, perhaps—though she didn't give it much thought now. She wanted Professor Dumbledore to explain, but Harriet sensed she'd stumbled upon a topic beyond her, like a weed with a root that went down, down, down into the earth, and no matter how hard she pulled, she'd never get to the end of it, and would only get a handful of slivers for her effort.

 _Hermione was right, though_ , she thought. _The staff knows a lot more than they're telling us. Why does the Board want Hogwarts open? Is someone trying to frame Professor Slytherin?_ Harriet flinched when Livi nudged her hand, then let her fingers slip over his horns and the smooth, dry scales of his snout, coming to linger on the gem set in his skull.

"I know you would like to know more, Harriet, but I fear it wouldn't be safe to tell you. I would not burden you with knowledge beyond your control."

Harriet just nodded.

"Why did you not come to me when you heard the voice? Or to Professor Snape, perhaps?"

"Well, I—. At first, I thought I'd imagined it, and then—then I was nervous, I guess. It took me a while to figure out it was a snake, and then I didn't know what kind of snake it was."

"I hope you feel able to tell us information like this in the future, my dear girl. Either myself or Professor Snape—or Professor McGonagall, who had a great many wonderful things to say about our reptilian friend here when we crossed paths in the hall."

Harriet winced. " _You got me in trouble,_ " she muttered to Livi, whose answering look plainly said he disagreed. The serpent continued to coil himself tightly in her lap, settling in like an irreverent cat who cared little for the fact that Harriet would have to get up eventually.

Just then, Fawkes gave a mournful cry, and when the bespectacled witch lifted her chin to look at him, the bird burst into flames.

Harriet jumped to her feet and Livi hit the floor with a thump. "Professor Dumbledore!"

The Headmaster sat in his chair still, smiling, and Harriet was sure he'd gone round the bend when he chuckled. "Well, it's about time. He's been looking dreadful for days now and I've been hoping he'd get on with it."

"Wh—?"

"Fawkes is a phoenix, Harriet. It's his Burning Day."

"Yes, I know he's a—! Oh," she finished with a soft breath, the flames settling as swiftly as they'd ignited, Livi hissing furious words at Harriet's feet. Harriet had read that phoenixes were reborn from their own ashes, but she hadn't expected to see such a thing herself, or for it to be so—explosive. Or sudden. Or panic-inducing.

 _I thought I set him on fire accidentally like Uncle Vernon's trousers. Holy Merlin._

Professor Dumbledore stood and shuffled around the desk, going to the golden stand now sporting nothing but a few wilted feathers and a pile of soot. "Witches and wizards in the east say it's good luck to see a Burning Day," he commented as he started to gently brush his fingertips through the ash. "They say it's a miracle, and maybe they're right. It certainly is very strange and wondrous magic."

A bald baby chick emerged, chirping softly, wiggling its newborn wings as Professor Dumbledore smiled down at his familiar. As Harriet watched, she couldn't help but think the Headmaster's words described all kinds of magic, be it the kind that revived phoenixes from their fiery grave, or the kind that could Petrify the dead. It was all strange, wondrous—

And often terrifying.

* * *

 **A/N: It always annoyed me that the Board of Governors was only brought up in canon, what? Once? Twice? I personally find it interesting to have more checks and balances to the Headmaster's power.**

 **Harriet: "Professor, your bird is on fire."**

 **Dumbledore: "Good."**


	78. watchful eyes

**_lxxviii. watchful eyes_**

"Hermione, you're going to miss your train."

"It's fine," the witch in question replied, waving an idle hand without taking her eyes off the cauldron. "I've plenty of time yet."

"If by plenty of time you mean fifteen minutes, then yeah."

Hermione gave the potion another stir, and Harriet huffed. As they stood clustered in the damp stall, the three Slytherin witches could hear the occasional voice passing in the corridor, followed by jogging footsteps or squealing familiars or thumping pieces of luggage. Harriet _knew_ if Hermione managed to miss her train home, she and Elara would somehow catch the blame, and she wasn't keen on spending the whole of the holiday chopping ingredients for Snape.

Elara would probably end up stabbing him with a paring knife.

"—Harriet."

"Hmm?"

She turned her gaze to Hermione again and almost went cross-eyed looking at the small vial she held up to her nose. "Be _careful_ ," Hermione said as Harriet took the vial, scrutinizing the insides. "That's the only hair I managed to get off of Professor Sinistra."

"This plan is barmy, I hope you know."

"It's _not_. It's perfectly logical! Professor Sinistra doesn't often leave the Astronomy Tower, thus lowering the prospective chances of you being caught—but she _does_ leave sometimes, which means your—or _her_ —presence won't be suspicious. Elara will go to her office and keep the professor busy with questions just to ensure she doesn't wander down to the staff room."

"And how am I supposed to get information, Hermione? ' _Jolly good, let me freshen your cuppa, Slytherin—oh, by the way, what's in your great-great-great grandda's secret chamber there?_ '"

"Don't be glib, Harriet. You'll do no such thing." Hermione gave the cauldron a final stir, then removed the ladle, returning it to the open kit. "No, professors gossip just as much as any student. I can't even begin to tell you the things I've heard them half-say before they realize I'm in the room with another teacher—but that's not the point. No, you're just there to _learn_ what they know, not interrogate them. That'd be an intolerable risk and—foolish."

"But what if I don't find anything out? What if I actually _do_ manage to make the potion, but none of the professors are around or they just don't mention the Chamber? What then?"

"That's the only risk we should be taking, really." Hermione took a deep breath, then exhaled. "The potion is a means to an end, Harriet—and if we can't find out what we want to know _safely_ , then there's no point to it, is there? If you don't learn anything new, so be it. We'll find another way—find a spell, or another potion, or something. We're clever enough and cunning enough not to get caught by being silly."

"If you say so," Harriet mumbled, blinking owlishly as she looked down into the Polyjuice Potion, still holding the vial with Professor Sinistra's hair. It was a convoluted but bizarrely simple plan in her opinion, and if Harriet followed Hermione's directions, she'd manage all right. She knew from experience adults became much more chatty when they didn't know children were around, and while Harriet believed Slytherin would be more circumspect, the professor _did_ have an arrogant streak in him that could work in their favor.

Harriet groaned and rubbed at her eyes, almost knocking off her glasses.

"Don't touch your face, you're in a loo, Harriet."

"I didn't put my hands in the toilet or something, Elara, for Merlin's sake."

"Still. It's unsanitary."

Harriet dropped her arms back to her side and resisted the urge to scowl. Hermione whipped out a large scroll from her bag and shoved it toward the shorter witch, who took it—and nearly dropped both it and the vial in the cauldron, surprised by the weight. "Those are all my notes on the Polyjuice. I copied and annotated all the directions from the book, noting all the proper colors and smells, what the potion should look like before adding the hair, etcetera."

Gawking, Harriet realized it must have taken Hermione ages to put all this together, and she felt another prickle of worry and nerves go through her. Hermione was the one who'd put in all the work, and now she was handing off the nearly finished potion to Harriet, confident she wouldn't make a total mess of things. The younger Slytherin swallowed.

"I'll do my best. I promise."

"I know you will." Hermione exhaled, then fidgeted with her bag. If Harriet didn't know better, she'd say the other girl was stalling and purposefully cutting her chances of making the train short. Why? Didn't she want to see her mum and dad? "Well, we'd best hurry down to the entrance hall."

Harriet secreted the notes and vial away into her robes' pocket, moving Kevin up into her collar out of the way. "Wait, hang on, I've got this—."

She yanked the Invisibility Cloak out, earning a bemused look from both of her friends as she hurried to explain. "Well, there's a lot of people about, isn't there? And they'll be more suspicious after what happened to Finch-Fletchley, so I thought it might look odd if three girls came out of a loo _no one_ ever goes into and—."

"It's a great idea," Hermione rushed to assure her. "Does it cover all three of us?"

The Cloak did, in fact, cover all three witches, but not without a fair share of shuffling, toe-treading, and misplaced elbows. Elara had to hunch and Harriet wound up caught between the two with a mouthful of Hermione's frizzy hair, and yet the trio managed to quietly slip from Myrtle's loo into the corridor with no one the wiser. Good thing, too, because not a moment later, Professor Flitwick came bustling past, a pocketwatch balanced in his hand as he muttered under his breath.

"Let's go this way—."

They hurried along the hall, then took off the Cloak once out of sight of Flitwick and the loo. Harriet stuffed the Cloak back into her robes, and together they walked through the History of Magic corridor, avoiding the suit of armor prone to kicking students who crowded too close to it. A low, droning voice echoed from one of the abandoned classrooms, but Harriet paid it no mind; she knew from experience it was only a ghost named Cuthbert Binns, who had supposedly been a professor both before and after he died, until he finally got the sack. Of course, they couldn't _really_ sack a ghost, so the class got moved to a different end of the corridor, and Professor Binns went right on teaching, even if he didn't have any students.

Professor Selwyn was at his desk, writing a letter, the quill whipping from side to side. They scuttled by his open door as quickly as they could. _Shouldn't he be down with the other teachers making sure no one gets left behind?_

Hermione pulled back a dusty tapestry, and they went single-file through a dark and stuffy secret passage that somehow managed to drop them down a level without having any stairs. The trio came out onto the main floor, where the voices of their fellows echoed louder, and Harriet could hear Professor McGonagall scolding someone over the crackle of a Filibuster Firework.

"Merlin, who thought it was a good idea to set one of those off…."

It appeared most everyone was running late that morning, as students dashed about the entrance hall, accounting for their things, all while their professors urged them out the doors. Hermione, who had everything she needed already tucked into her satchel, yanked both Harriet and Elara into a hug. Elara stood there like she was unsure what to do with her hands, and Harriet squeezed both of them just because she could.

"You're squishing my lungs, Harriet…."

"You both be safe," Hermione said, voice quiet but fierce as she let go and stepped back. "Do your holiday assignments. And for goodness' sake, don't go chasing after any strange voices, and _don't_ antagonize Professor Snape."

"Neither of us antagonizes him. I just breathe in his direction and the bloke has a fit."

Hermione wasn't convinced given her stern look, but she shook her head and dropped the topic. With a final wave, she turned and set off after the other students hurrying down the steps in their winter robes, white flecks whirling in the air and coming to land upon the entrance hall's stone floor. A few snowflakes touched Harriet's hair and melted.

"She's safer out of the castle," Elara muttered as they watched their friend go. Harriet nodded, sad to see Hermione leave, but pleased she'd have a chance to see her parents and escape the Chamber's looming threat. She _would_ be safer outside Hogwarts for now.

The holidays seemed unusually grim to Harriet, and she wasn't looking forward to the weeks ahead. She had to finish the Polyjuice without messing up, and both she and Elara would have to avoid Snape and Slytherin and probably every other professor so their plans wouldn't be bungled before they even began. She thought of what Professor Dumbledore had said when she'd yelled at him—and Harriet could hardly believe she'd done _that_. What had gotten into her?!—pondering the answers to all the questions she wanted to ask.

Something wasn't right, and not because there was an invisible, Petrifying monster slithering about. The Board of Governors wouldn't let the Headmaster close the school, and Minister Gaunt wouldn't send a competent Auror to assist them, and _someone_ kept writing those weird, incriminating messages on the walls. _Slytherin's Heir will cleanse the dirty-blooded_. The only bloody _Heir of Slytherin_ at Hogwarts was _Professor Slytherin_ , so someone clearly had it out for the wizard.

Something just _wasn't_ right, and like Professor Dumbledore told her, sometimes the easiest solutions weren't all they appeared.

Frowning, Harriet started to turn from the doors—and paused when she spotted Longbottom lurking outside the Great Hall. "Oh, bloody hell."

Both the Boy Who Lived and several Weasleys lingered there, all still dressed in their school robes, watching the other students sprint outside for the carriages. Longbottom was glaring at Harriet and Elara, suspicion clear in his dumb face, and Harriet wanted nothing more than to swear at the git. "Doesn't he have a bloody family to go home to?" she whispered. "He's going to be watching us! As if having stupid Snape around wasn't bad enough—."

The wizard in question stood on the upper landing, deep in conversation with Professor Dumbledore—until Mr. Lockhart came gallivanting over, at which point both the Headmaster and Potions Master broke off their discussion with mirrored looks of aggravation. If Harriet hadn't been so peeved about Longbottom, she would have laughed.

"Come on, let's go to the common room. It should be quiet there."

Shooting a final ugly look toward Longbottom, Harriet shuffled after Elara—who moved with far more poise and much better posture. "Why d'you walk so pretty?"

"Why don't you pick up your feet?"

"I'm being serious!"

"So was I." The bustle and cheer of the entrance hall faded behind them as the pair descended into the dungeons, their footsteps resounding in the enclosed space. Torchlight guided their way into the overwhelming dark. "If you're swatted enough for slouching, it becomes a habit not to do so."

"Oh," Harriet said, voice quiet. A muscle worked in Elara's jaw, and she refused to look in her direction.

"Besides, doesn't Mrs. Malfoy harangue you about sitting up straight and dressing properly? You're still writing letters to her, aren't you?"

"Yeah. I didn't think I was going to, but I dunno. Some of the stuff she says is bollocks, but she also tells me interesting bits here and there about everything." Harriet glanced down at her too-big jumper under her robes and tried straightening both it and the buttoned shirt beneath it. "You don't think I dress funny, do you?"

"No. I think you're fine the way you are." They came upon the hidden entrance to the common room and Elara gave the password. "Are you going to read Hermione's notes?"

"Yeah, I better get started on it. I think this scroll weighs more than I—."

Harriet came to a stop mid-sentence as she bumped into Elara's back, who stood frozen not two feet past the hidden wall. Confused, Harriet peered around her—and flinched, because Professor Slytherin sat by the main hearth, his profile cast in shadow by the firelight, one leg crossed over the other and a goblet in his hand. As Harriet and Elara came inside, he turned, placed the goblet aside, and stood.

"Good—good morning, Professor Slytherin," Harriet managed to say, both surprised and wary. What was he doing there? He only ever came to the common room when he wanted to chew out the whole of the House for something terrible happening.

"Good morning, Miss Potter, Miss Black," the wizard replied. He smiled, but Harriet knew it was fake, his red eyes narrowed and cold as they inspected her and Elara. His robes rippled as he stepped forward, the fire at his back throwing his face deeper into shadow. Harriet could only see the vague glint of his teeth and startling eyes in the weak glow given by the silver lanterns. "My, my. Is this not the second Yule holiday you've remained at the school, Potter? Where are your relatives?"

Thinking about the Dursleys forced Harriet to stiffen her spine, though she almost fidgeted and looked away. She decided to feed him the same lie she gave Snape last year, because though he hadn't looked convinced, it was _technically_ true. "They work, Professor."

"Hmm. And you, Black?"

"I'm emancipated and can spend the holidays as I please, sir."

He continued to approach them until he stopped not two feet away, looking down his nose at both witches with something harsh and doubtful glittering behind his eyes. "As you are the only Slytherins remaining behind, I felt it _prudent_ to remind you both of the curfew and my expectations."

"Yes, professor."

"Refrain from wandering and…mingling. You'd both be fools not to realize _someone_ in this school seeks to sully my name—and thus _your_ names as well, given all of Slytherin House shares in this uncalled for maligning. Stick to the common room unless your presence is necessitated elsewhere, and should I find either of you out after hours…. Well, let's just say the consequences will be quite dire indeed."

Harriet could only nod, and Elara looked grim.

Slytherin continued to study them for another minute, his hands loose at his sides, until he seemed satisfied. "Good. I remember assigning you an essay for the break; I expect an additional foot from both of you. It's best to keep busy, lest idle minds turn to…mischief." He cocked his head to one side, and over his shoulder hissed, " _Watch them._ "

" _Yesss, Massster._ "

With that said, Slytherin swept by Harriet and Elara, disappearing into the corridor with barely a sound to note his departure. Harriet watched the serpent in the painted rowan roots curl itself around the wild tree, its sharp, beady eyes trained on hers even across the room. She didn't inform Elara of what Professor Slytherin had said, because one didn't need to be a Parselmouth to know it hadn't been good.

Harriet took her friend by the hand, and they escaped into the dorms.

* * *

 **A/N: I know Draco and a bunch of other Slytherins stayed for the hols in the book—but that kinda goes against the headcanon I've established where most students head home for the Yule break. So, no Draco.**


	79. changing skins

**_lxxix. changing skins_**

Despite the worry and trepidation hanging around the castle like dark clouds in the air, Harriet couldn't deny Hogwarts was beautiful at this time of the year.

Snow blanketed the grounds, and all around them, the highlands slumbered beneath the crisp white sheet and the trees swayed dark and solemn, the lake a solid, gleaming sheet of hoary ice. Icicles clung to the eaves, growing along the ramparts, and whenever one fell, it dissipated into a fuzzy swarm of magic and frost, fogging the windows and the unawares in dewy drafts. Hagrid dragged pine trees into the Great Hall and the professors decorated them with magic and delicate things, fairies hiding in the needles, their giggles seeming to follow Harriet wherever she went, fairy dust sprinkled on her shoulders and in her hair. A Yule Log burned in the Hall's hearth, Charmed to remain until the hols came to an end.

She enjoyed herself more than she had the year prior, simply because Elara was there with her. They snuck back and forth from Myrtle's loo with her Invisibility Cloak and hid in Harriet's trunk to pore through Hermione's exhaustive Polyjuice research. In direct contrast to Professor Slytherin's orders, the Headmaster had Snape come drag them out of the dungeons if they spent too long down there alone, and so the pair of witches went exploring, enjoying the library, or avoiding the Defense teacher. They did homework in the Great Hall by the fire and oftentimes a professor would come sit with them to help or chat.

On Christmas Day—or, well, the day of the Solstice—Harriet woke to find a smattering of gifts left on the foot of her bed, an occurrence that would never cease to surprise the bespectacled girl. Elara had the same assorted collection of presents, though she was far less enthused when poked away by her dormmate only an hour or so past dawn.

"Harriet, I'm going to murder you."

"Murder me after we open gifts, c'mon!"

They sat in their nightgowns with their coverlets pulled up around their shoulders to ward off the dungeons' chill and started in on their presents. Harriet received the same thoughtful, if trivial, trinkets from the old families, including another packet of parchment with her family crest from the House of Black. From Elara personally, she unwrapped a pretty, deep violet quill that shimmered with silver threads when she brought it up to her eyes.

"It's made from an Occamy's feather," the other witch explained as she prised open a Transfigured box. "It's for letter writing. Oh—are these gloves, Harriet?"

"Yeah! I ordered them for you. They're supposed to feel more…what's the word? Tactile? And they're water-repelling."

"Thank you." Elara pulled the black gloves on over her pale, slim hands.

"Hermione got me a kit for my broom, excellent."

"Did Malfoy send you anything?"

"His family—or his mum did, at least. Chocolate Frogs."

Harriet picked up one of her final gifts, a sizable, lumpy parcel wrapped in butcher paper and twine. She recognized the writing on the card, and hummed thoughtfully, wondering what it could be. "I got something from Mr. Flamel and his wife."

"What is it?"

The paper tore, and heavy, cool fabric puddled in Harriet's hands. "I think they're robes." They were black in color with fine, silver threads at edges and a silk, sage-colored lining.

"Go on, try them on."

Unearthing herself from the blankets and strewn packaging, Harriet got to her feet and tried to find where the robes opened. Wizarding fashion could be funny in its design. "Why are they so _big_?"

"You're putting them on wrong."

"No, I'm not. Look—." As soon as she stepped into the robes and pushed her skinny arms through the overly large sleeves, the fabric came alive and swaddled her, scaring a high-pitched yelp out of Harriet. The cloth drew itself snug about her frame, sleeves shortening and tightening, sash cinching tight as a silver brooch snapped shut on her shoulder, closing the front. The startled witch stood still, arms held out, and waited to see if the robes would move again.

On the other bed, Elara snorted, lowering the book given to her by Hermione. "It's just a sizing Charm. Though, I haven't seen one quite so…enthusiastic before."

"Me neither."

"Those are nice, though. Go look."

Harriet went to the mirror on the wall and gazed at her reflection, taking in the image of her bedraggled hair coupled with the clean, straight lines of the robes. The collar came up around her neck, hiding most of her scar, and the skirt and hem fell in gentle, tapered waves around her legs. The lining rippled with magic, shimmering leaves seeming to drift in an unseen breeze against the silk. Harriet owned a few pairs of robes besides her school outfits, but none of this quality, and none quite so lovely.

She moved back to the bed and found the card again. "He says they're spell-resistant. I wonder what that means, exactly."

Elara quirked a brow—then picked up her wand from the end table, and aimed a Stinging Hex at Harriet's side. Harriet jumped as the spell made contact, but the light fizzled out against the dense fabric. "Oh. Excellent. I wish I could wear these in Slytherin's class."

"It probably wouldn't help." Elara replaced her wand. "The spells coming back at you in Defense are your own, and undoubtedly more powerful than what a simple cloth enchantment can handle."

They finished opening their gifts, then set about getting ready for the day, Harriet showering and donning her new robes once again after Elara tugged her wayward hair into a braid. They journeyed upstairs for breakfast—then scrapped that plan when they peeked inside and found the House and High Tables replaced with a single table down the hall's middle, the only seats open left between Longbottom and Slytherin. Neither girl decided they had much of an appetite.

They escaped outside, and though it was bitterly cold in the breeze, it was much warmer in the open planter cloister by the greenhouses, the space filled to the brim with pots of all shapes and sizes and mostly dormant flora, gnomes snoozing in the dirt with crumpled leaves as their blankets. Snow heaped itself on the low walls below the arches and steam rose in ghostly sheets from the heated greenhouses below.

"Longbottom was watching us," Elara commented as they sat on a stone bench and she smoothed her skirt. "I don't think he heard a word Weasley was saying to him; he was staring at the doors, waiting for us to show up."

Harriet grumbled under her breath. "Bloody Gryffindor."

They played with the snow for a time, letting it melt in the little pots Charmed with heating spells, pouring the water out and using the _Glacius_ Charm to freeze it into different shapes. Harriet made a passable—if a bit lop-sided and big-headed—bird, while Elara crafted a dog. "Look," Harriet said, holding her tiny ice sculpture in the palm of her cold hand. "I'm going to name him Draco, because—."

"Because it has a fat head?"

Harriet started to laugh.

The screech of an owl brought them to attention, and a miffed barn owl fluttered through an arch, clasping a tightly rolled newspaper in its talons. "Ah, the Prophet," Elara muttered, patting her pockets. "Do you have any money on you, Harriet?"

"Let me see." She had to unclasp the robes to reach her trousers' pockets, and after checking there, she searched her jumper. "Oh. I have a Sickle, though that's a bit much for a paper."

Elara sighed and took the Sickle, tucking it into the little leather pouch on the owl's leg so it would relinquish its delivery. "I'll pay you back later."

"It's fine."

The taller witch sat with her back to the cold, her shoulders stiff, and read the paper while Harriet tried to make an ice-snake to eat ice-Draco, and ended up with something that better resembled a hungry scarf. Elara made a sudden, thoughtful sound.

"What is it?"

"This." She flipped the paper about, folding it to show the main article on the second page. Harriet adjusted her glasses and squinted against the paltry winter light, trying to read.

"' _Wizengamot questions Headmaster's eff—efficacy during troubled times. Defense Instructor's ability under scrutiny._ ' Well, the bit about Dumbledore is awful. Do you think they'll give Slytherin the sack?"

"Not hardly. But this could work to our advantage."

"What? Explain."

Elara gave the paper an impatient shake. " _This_. We could do it today, after lunch. It's Christmas—the Solstice, and I doubt they're serving pumpkin juice to the professors. You can leave this out, casually flipped to this page, and whoever sees it is bound to have a comment on it."

"And what if they want to comment on it to _me_?" Harriet asked, keeping her voice low. "What would Professor Sinistra say?"

"Something about the stars aligning, whatever the fates will, etcetera." Elara folded the paper and handed it to Harriet. "Well? Are you ready? Do you want to do it today?"

Harriet exhaled, wishing she could tell Elara she didn't want to do this _at all_ , because it sounded precisely like the kind of thing that would get her in heaps of trouble, but Harriet kept quiet. "Yes. I only need to fold in the bicorn horn, and we'd have to wait for it to simmer."

Elara met her eyes, and then nodded. "Okay, then. After lunch."

 **xXx**

Harriet could hardly eat a thing by the time lunch finally did manage to roll around. Worrying about the Polyjuice made her stomach twist up in knots, and she felt as if everyone at the table was giving her funny looks. Longbottom glared at her and Elara, his eyes narrow and shifty, Snape scowled every time she accidentally turned in his direction, and even Luna Lovegood, the only Ravenclaw staying for the hols, shot her several puzzled, contemplative looks.

She wound up spilling hot cider down her front, which was how she found out her new robes were stain-resistant, too, which was a nice addition.

Elara just held her head in her hands.

They split up after the meal, and Harriet went alone to Myrtle's loo, taking the long way, diving through at least one secret passage to make sure anyone—namely Longbottom—wouldn't be able to follow if they tried. She found the Polyjuice just as she'd left it the day before, settling in its cauldron atop the toilet, Hermione's magic still warding away the damp. Harriet rolled up her sleeves, opened the potions kit, and consulted Hermione's notes again.

It was a nerve-wracking thing, brewing a potion one intended to consume. She'd made dozens of potions by now, but each of those had gone to Professor Snape, and Harriet always felt a certain safety in brewing when she knew the potion wouldn't poison or kill someone if she made a mistake. A bit too much billywig? Not enough scarab beetle? No big deal. But now, as she used a flat stirring rod to carefully tuck and fold the potion around the sprinkled bicorn horn, cold sweat prickled the back of her neck.

What if she messed up? What if she bloody _poisoned_ herself? Oh, Harriet remembered only too well how it felt to be poisoned after Quirrell spiked her tea. The thought of enduring that again made her ill.

Elara returned later, carrying a bundle under her arm, and found Harriet leaning on the partition next to the cooling cauldron. "It's done, then?"

Harriet nodded.

"Excellent. Well done, Harriet," Elara smiled—one of her rare, full smiles, and Harriet tried to return it, but she'd gone weak in the knees, her hands shaking. "Are you all right?"

"'M fine."

Hesitating, Elara touched her shoulder. "No, you're not. Harriet, if you don't wish to do this, then don't. You shouldn't allow anyone, especially Hermione and me, to pressure you into anything. The potion will keep if we bottle it up. You can give it to Hermione when she returns."

"It's fine," Harriet sighed through her nose and rubbed her eyes, thankful Elara didn't gripe about her touching her face. "I'm just—afraid I botched it. What'll happen when I drink it?"

"I could drink it, if you want."

"No," she shook her head. "No, if anyone's going to be laid up in hospital because I can't brew worth a shite, it'll be me."

"A terribly Gryffindor sentiment. What are we going to do with you?" Elara pulled out the bundle she'd brought, and when Harriet took it in her hands, she realized it was a set of robes, a dark emerald pair for a witch, done with constellations and stars stitched into the panels.

"Are these—these are Professor Sinistra's! I've seen her wear these before! How did you get these?"

"Laundry," Elara said without pause, turning the robes over to show Harriet the book and flask she'd included. When Harriet continued to stare at her, the other witch frowned. "Where did you think I went for so long? They're clean. I was bribing house-elves."

"Bribing _house_ —."

"This—." Elara tapped the book, ignoring Harriet's sputtering. "Is the _Quasar Quarterly_."

"An astronomy periodical? How did you get _that_?"

"Well, just because Hermione thinks astrology is rubbish and you hate the maths doesn't mean _I_ can't like the subject." She pinked in the cheeks and cleared her throat. "I would assume Professor Sinistra receives the same subscription. Just pretend to read it. Turn the pages every so often. And this—." She touched the flask. "How many hours of Polyjuice did you brew?"

"Twelve," Harriet recited. "Err, or less. Hermione said it's meant to be twelve—but this is our first time brewing it, right? So it might not be as potent, and if it's 'contaminated' at all, or watered down, it could be less. There should be at least six hours there."

"And one mouthful is supposed to last an hour?"

"Or less. 'A mouthful' isn't an exact measurement, is it? And different people have different sized bodies and stuff, and Snape always goes on about how the 'internal composition of organs and blood impact potion viability' and whatnot. So, I can bank on thirty minutes, then I have to drink again, just to make sure." She extracted the flask from the robes. "Is this Professor Sinistra's too?"

Smirking, Elara nodded.

"No! I wouldn't have fancied her a lush."

"I actually think she puts coffee in there, when she has to be up during the day. Her entire area of study is night-based, Harriet."

"Oh, my mistake." Sighing, Harriet put the flask, book, and robes up on the dry back of the toilet's tank. "Might as well get this over with."

She fished the vial out of her pocket and removed the professor's single hair, letting it drop into the cauldron. For a second, nothing happened, and then the liquid morphed into a murky purple shot through with lighter bands of lavender and periwinkle.

"Put the robes on before you drink the potion."

Harriet glanced at Elara, confused—and then realized what the other witch meant. "Right. Thanks."

Elara stepped out of the stall, letting Harriet shut the door and shuck her own clothes and pull on Professor Sinistra's, the excess cloth puddling around her smaller frame. Minding the sleeves, Harriet ladled Polyjuice into the flask, and once it was almost too full, she stopped, looking at the dubious goop like it might jump out of the flask and attack her. Sighing, Harriet muttered, "Cheers," and drank.

The taste of dusty blueberries burst on her tongue and Harriet almost gagged, not because it was terribly unpleasant, but because it was unexpected and overwhelming. She held down her gorge and swallowed, having to do so several times as the thick, syrupy potion seemed to cling to her mouth and esophagus. "Ugh."

The effects weren't immediate; indeed, Harriet assumed she'd messed something up along the way, because all she felt was a slight queasiness in her middle. Then, the queasiness changed to a sharp, aching tightness, spreading from her middle to her chest, and Harriet squeezed her eyes shut, leaning on the partition. Her legs burned, pain shooting through her knees, and Harriet wanted to yell for Elara, tell her something was wrong, but all she could do was gasp and wheeze as the skin of her arms bubbled, darkened, and then—.

Then, it was over.

Breathing heavily, Harriet blinked, wondering what was wrong with her eyes—before she realized Professor Sinistra didn't wear glasses, and she lifted a shaky, unfamiliar hand to remove them. The astronomy professor wasn't a large woman by any means, but she _was_ considerably larger than Harriet. The second-year Slytherin found herself too tall, her legs too long, rounded in unexpected ways with more weight in different areas. She touched her chest—until she realized she'd just groped her professor, no matter how inadvertent, and blushed from her cheeks to her toes.

"Merlin," she wheezed in a strange, husky voice. She thanked every force in the bloody universe that Hermione hadn't picked a male professor.

"Harriet?"

"I'm, um—."

Elara repeated her name with more urgency, shaking the door. Harriet reached out and unlatched it.

They stared at one another, a spooked shadow passing through Elara's colorless eyes as she found herself looking at one of her professors, sweaty and shivering in a loo, looking for all the world like they'd seen something ghastly. Harriet just couldn't believe how _tall_ Elara was, given she could meet her eyes without looking down. "It—." Elara cleared her throat. "It worked."

"At least I didn't poison myself," Harriet said—then winced, because while she had Professor Sinistra's voice, she _didn't_ sound quite the same. How odd. "Err, I better not talk. Sinistra has more of a Scouse accent than I do. I sound weird."

Elara nodded. "Okay. I'm going to go now and make sure Professor Sinistra stays in her office. Don't forget your flask, the book, and the paper."

"I won't."

"Okay. Meet you here before dinner?"

"Yes."

The other Slytherin left, leaving Harriet to gather her scattered wits and ignore the mirrors, not wanting to glimpse herself in its depths. She'd never use Polyjuice again; the invasiveness of it had her on edge, and Harriet couldn't convince herself the unsettled rock in her gut wasn't from drinking liquefied lacewing flies and whatever other nonsense Hermione had tossed in the cauldron. She stole several deep, calming breaths and tried to stand like Professor Sinistra would, which necessitated a brief stint in front of the mirrors, the pinched scowl she wore like nothing she'd ever seen on the astronomy instructor.

For all her planning, Elara hadn't given Harriet shoes, so she made do with resizing her own, happy the robes fell to her feet and concealed them. Eventually, she had no further reason to procrastinate and hang about, so Harriet schooled her expression and forced her anxiety back, thinking about all manner of unpleasant things, including each she'd lied to the Dursleys. She hadn't been a guiltless child at times, and now she tried to channel that same nervous steel she'd forced into her spine whenever faced with a furious Uncle Vernon.

Water dripped below the sinks as Harriet counted to ten and opened her eyes—a _stranger's_ eyes. She could do this. For Hermione.

She gathered her periodical and her paper, tucked them under her arm, stepped out of the loo—

And almost collided with Neville Longbottom.

 _Shite_.

* * *

 **A/N: Harriet: "I'm never drinking your funny toilet potions ever again, Hermione."**


	80. little lies

**_lxxx. little lies_**

The Boy Who Lived stood not two feet from the door with his hand outstretched, looking as if he'd been reaching for the handle before it popped open.

Harriet gasped as they ran into one another. She went to quip a scathing remark—but the frightened, shocked look in Longbottom's wide-eyes stilled her and returned a measure of clarity to Harriet's anxious, startled thoughts.

 _He thinks I'm Professor Sinistra._

"Wh—what do you think you're doing, Long—Mr. Longbottom?" Harriet demanded, hoping his own surprise helped cover the strange pitch of her voice. She tried to concentrate and thought back on every lecture she'd ever heard Professor Sinistra give—but all her classes happened in the middle of the night, and Harriet could rarely concentrate on her voice without dozing off. It always sounded soft and far away, like the witch was a hooting night owl who deigned to fly over and teach at the school.

"Professor Sinistra!" Neville exclaimed, gone pale in the face. "I was—I—uh, have you seen Potter by any chance?"

"Potter?" She wanted to kick Longbottom in the shins. Was he actually following her?! What a berk! "Potter from Slytherin?"

"Yes, ma'am. You see, I was worried about her going off on her own, given what's been occurring lately. It's not safe."

 _Rubbish!_

"Is that what you're doing, trying to go into a girl's loo—lavatory? Well?"

Longbottom gave her a funny look, though he had the grace to blush with embarrassment. "This is Moaning Myrtle's place, isn't it? I was told no one ever used it. I knew she came this way, and just, uh, wanted to make sure Pot—Harriet was okay." His eyes narrowed, a small furrow appearing between his light brows. "What are you doing here, Professor?"

 _Does he honestly talk to all of his professors like this?_

"That is none of your business, Longbottom. Err—ten points from Gryffindor! Yes!"

"What?! But that's not—!"

"Get back to your dormitory, or I'll make it twenty! Go on!"

He didn't need to be told again, but Harriet did catch the second odd glance he threw at her over his shoulder as he retreated. He disappeared around the corner, and Harriet exhaled, her heart beating much too fast in her chest, her hands shaky where they clasped the book and newspaper to her chest. A laugh bubbled out of her mouth, and Harriet coughed, reminding herself to be serious.

She couldn't remember how long it'd been since she first drank the potion—ten minutes? Fifteen? How long was she in the loo before she left? How long until she reached the staffroom? What if she suddenly turned back into herself? What then?

Puffing out her cheeks, Harriet stepped forward, thinking it better to move than to stand frozen in place like a numpty. She hurried, shoes creating a steady, firm series of clicks against the stones as she walked and tried to set a casual pace, though walking in someone else's body proved difficult. She tripped twice, earning one muttered comment about being "drunk on the job" from a crotchety portrait of a wizard with an ear horn.

Set came alive at one point, whirling about her feet in the flickering torchlight, and he threw himself toward a convenient door. Harriet didn't question him and did as indicated, cursing her clumsy limbs as she stepped inside the room and eased the door closed. Moments later, McGonagall rounded the far bend and hustled by. Harriet didn't breathe until the witch was out of sight again.

 _Merlin!_

The remainder of her trip to the staffroom proved uneventful, and Harriet felt profoundly lucky to find the room empty, embers sputtering in the wide hearth flanked by gargoyles, the antique tables barren with the chairs neatly tucked in. There were four tall, cushioned chairs facing the fire, their backs to the largest table probably used in staff meetings. Glancing about to make sure she was alone, Harriet set out the paper like Elara had suggested, tilting the chair as if someone had gotten up in a rush and forgotten it there. She went to the tea-station by the old wardrobe, made herself a cuppa, and quickly sunk into one of the wing chairs by the hearth, shielding herself from casual observation.

The carriage clock on the mantel chimed the hour. Harriet fumbled about in her pockets for the flask and took a measured sip. The taste of blueberries lingered as she opened the periodical on her lap and stared at the clock. Around her, the castle remained quiet and snowflakes stuck to the window's glass.

An hour passed, an hour spent fretting and twiddling with the pages of Elara's booklet, the tea cold as bones on the little table by Harriet's seat. She drank from the flask twice more, once after thirty minutes had passed, and then again on the hour. The lower the potion inside dipped, the more anxious Harriet became, sweat prickling on her spine. What if Hermione and Elara were wrong? What if _no one_ came around? What if Harriet just sat drinking tea as Professor Sinistra until her time ran out? What then?

A clatter at the door put an end to her inner woes, and a second later it popped open, propelled by magic instead of a hand, Professor Slytherin sauntering inside with Professor Snape looming at his heels.

"—with that blond half-wit gallivanting about, dogging my every move. I've cursed the fool thrice and think a fourth attempt will render what little brains he has irredeemable."

Professor Slytherin spoke in a harsh, dark tone Harriet had only ever heard him once or twice, the same voice he used after she dared hex him and he chucked her into a desk. He slammed the door shut behind Snape with a wave of his hand.

"Lockhart is, in and of himself, harmless," Snape drawled. "He doesn't know half of what he's looking at and spends much of his time locked in his office, doing Merlin knows what."

He sounded odd to Harriet too, not at all like the Snape who'd spent part of the summer at Grimmauld Place. _That_ Snape was always bitter and snappish and prone to sniping at them over dinner. His temper sparked with a word and fell just as quickly. _This_ Snape was cold, laconic. He spoke with all the emotionless precision of a knife dicing potions ingredients, and Harriet didn't like it at _all_.

"Being utterly useless and inconvenient." The pair passed Harriet's seat, their shadows moving on the floor. Slytherin paused. "This _rag!_ Who left this here?"

Harriet almost jumped out of her skin when Slytherin jerked the paper off the table and threw it over her head, right into the fire. The pages curled and blackened in an instant.

" _Bloody_ Gaunt," Slytherin quietly seethed. The pair of dark wizards continued to the seats against the wall by the window, a chessboard between them waiting to be played. It was harder for Harriet to hear their voices, but not impossible. "He never called a session with the Wizengamot, and half the stupid population knows that, but they choke down the Prophet's tripe like gospel. He aims to start an inquiry that will remove both myself and the old man from the castle for at least a short period of time."

"It is a proverbial show of strength."

"There's nothing _proverbial_ about it." Slytherin Summoned a bottle of wine from the rack by the tea-service, and his next words were given in undertone, so low Harriet almost missed them. "He means to ' _conquer the beast_ ' and thus further endear himself to the Board and undermine my authority. The Minister wishes for nothing more than to have a firm foothold here, one the Ministry has long been denied."

"Of course. How goes your search for the Basilisk?"

Harriet almost spat her tea out and had to swallow several times to keep herself from coughing, tears burning in her lashes. _The WHAT?!_

"Unsuccessful," Slytherin sneered, voice so cold Harriet thought Snape actually recoiled. Her Head of House poured himself a glass of dark wine and didn't offer the Potions Master any. Snape appeared bored and indifferent, unruffled by the slight. "Wherever Gaunt's agent has chosen to move it, I do not know, and it hasn't answered my call. I've scoured the Chamber from top to bottom and found no trace of the perpetrator."

By now, Harriet was silently wheezing in her chair, hands white-knuckled on the periodical in an attempt to hold onto something. _Basilisk! How could it possibly be a Basilisk?!_ she wondered—no, _demanded_ of her own thoughts. _Merlin's fricking beard! And he thinks it's Gaunt—Minister bloody Gaunt!—responsible for all this?! He knows where the Chamber is! And Snape knows he knows and—_.

Harriet continued to spiral, both wizards all but oblivious to her unobtrusive presence.

"I would suggest, again, that a second pair of eyes might help in—."

"And I would suggest, again, _Snape_ , for you to stop parroting the old man's orders." Slytherin's eyes narrowed in such a way that Professor Snape bowed his head, the dark curtain of his oily hair falling forward. "As I've stated before, the knowledge of my ancestor's Chamber is not pertinent, and I won't allow outsiders to sully a thousand-year-long legacy for no reason. What help do you possibly think you'd be, anyway?"

Snape's dark eyes flashed in her direction, then away, fixing on Slytherin.

"I know Aurora's there, Severus. I haven't said anything not already brought to her attention in staff meetings." He scoffed and drank his wine.

Harriet's head swam. She was so disoriented, she didn't have a chance to panic about being brought to their attention. A _Basilisk_ —a huge bloody Basilisk! How in the absolute _hell_ was a fifty-foot serpent mucking about in the castle undetected? Snippets of the monster book she'd read in the library haunted Harriet, little passages about deadly venom and huge eel heads and a look that could kill. _Holy shite! But how is it Petrifying people? The book mentioned nothing about that._

She glanced at the clock again—and jumped. Forty-five minutes had passed, lost somewhere between her own worrying, Slytherin's griping, and Harriet's private shock. The dark skin of her arms began to bubble, her hands looking like she'd thrust them into an active beehive. Harriet snatched the flask out of her pocket again and drank.

"Something the matter, Sinistra?"

Harriet didn't spill—she _didn't_ —but it was a near thing, and she couldn't stop herself from trembling when she turned her head far enough to see Snape staring at her. "Bit of a head cold," she said, pitching her voice low. It came out rough and passably ill sounding.

"Hmm."

Slytherin set his goblet aside. "Are Potter and Black minding themselves?" he asked Snape—and Harriet flinched. "I told them to stay in the dungeons."

Snape looked at Harriet for a moment longer, face inscrutable, then faced Professor Slytherin again. "I've had no difficulty with the brats."

"I asked them both why they remained for the break and received _unsatisfactory_ replies."

"The only type of reply they are fit to giving, I fear." Snape traced the row of buttons on his sleeve with an idle hand, his fingers long and pale against the black cloth. "Black was recently emancipated, as I'm sure she told you. She chose to remain with Potter, whose relatives work overseas for much of the year."

Slytherin grew bored of the conversation and returned to his wine, muttering scathing comments about Minister Gaunt again. _He just lied to him_ , Harriet marveled. _Snape just lied to Slytherin, right to his face without blinking an eye. How did he do that?_

They continued to speak on inconsequential matters and didn't bring up the Basilisk— _a bloody Basilisk!_ —again, only mentioning things concerning the students, their grades and behavior, and the school itself. Harriet knew they'd start talking about something more consequential the moment she left, but she'd already learned more than she thought she would. A lot more.

A Basilisk. Professor Slytherin thought Minister Gaunt—the _Minister for Magic_ himself—was behind the Chamber's opening, behind _his framing_. Why? Headmaster Dumbledore told her he feared it wouldn't be safe for Harriet to have this knowledge, and though Harriet despised being kept in the dark, she understood he had a reason; she'd blundered headfirst into a problem she hadn't the slightest hope of solving, and it didn't lessen her worries to know what the snake actually was. It made them so, so much worse.

She stood, wagering enough time had passed, and gathered her periodical. Slytherin kept talking to Snape about a promising new lesson plan he'd devised—and Merlin, wasn't it weird to hear Slytherin talk as if he actually _enjoyed_ teaching. The Potions Master's cold eyes snapped to Harriet as she moved, like a snake seeing something small and edible stir in the brush, then returned to the Defense instructor.

Harriet had a hand on the door when Snape stiffened and looked at her again—but this time, his eyes lingered on her shoes.

 _Harriet's_ shoes.

Snape opened his mouth as if to say something, and the Slytherin witch stepped into the corridor. She let the door come closed with a soft _click_ —and then started running.


	81. misery loves company

**_lxxxi. misery loves company_**

Severus hated the holidays.

He said the same thing every year, and every year the sentiment deepened; he despised the juvenility of it, the forced cheer, the interruption to his schedule. He cherished the brief, fleeting respite when the dunderheads first departed and quiet descended, as if the whole of Hogwarts held its breath—but then the stillness shattered; the castle mourned, his colleagues meddled, and Severus worried himself to distraction over Slytherin's plotting.

He hated the Yule time—and that had nothing to do with the fucking snake roaming loose in the school.

 _The Chamber of Secrets_. The moment Severus saw the writing on the wall, he—and Dumbledore—both knew Gaunt was testing the waters, testing his own power and Slytherin's hold on the student body, probing for weakness. No one else could find the Chamber, not even Albus bloody Dumbledore himself, and so the only person capable of opening it was Slytherin—or Gaunt, or Voldemort, or Riddle. It was all the same wretched person in the end.

The situation cycled back to the events of summer, beginning with Gaunt sending out lackeys to find the Potter girl. The Minister _knew_ something odd had occurred with Potter before the Mirror of Erised shattered, and he shouldn't know anything at all; they had a traitor in their midsts, one informed by the Minister on how to open the Chamber and move the Basilisk. It was curious that this informant knew to relocate it somewhere Slytherin couldn't find; the schisms between Slytherin's and Gaunt's minds made themselves apparent at the worst possible junctures.

"Black and Potter are up to something," Severus said as he leaned into the wall by the Headmaster's hearth. Night sunk fast over the highlands, lacing the stones with a harsh, biting chill that raked its claws against his bones. "Though it hardly needs saying."

"Oh?" Albus commented from behind his desk, having the audacity to pretend he didn't understand what Severus meant. "How so?"

The Potions Master thought it obvious; if Potter dumping hot cider down her front that afternoon like a twit hadn't been clue enough, then Black's stiff, blank expression confirmed his suspicions. Neither could lie to save their own skins.

"I didn't pursue them. I found my time better served keeping Slytherin preoccupied instead of chasing those idiots about like a madman herding spiteful cats."

Albus chuckled, blue eyes bright, and then sobered, turning his attention inward, following thoughts beyond Severus' knowledge. "She knows."

"Who knows what?"

"Harriet knows about the Basilisk—or, I should say, Harriet knows the creature set loose from the Chamber is a snake, not that it is a Basilisk."

Severus stared, and the cold at his back reached deeper, past his skin and bones and into his heart, a psychosomatic spasm curling his fingers in upon themselves. "How." It wasn't a question, and the Potions Master was sure he didn't want the answer. What if they'd…missed something? A curse laid by Quirrell? New curses were made every day, and who knew better what had occurred before the Mirror than the girl herself? Who else better equipped to speak the language of snakes and open the way in the Chamber?

What if she was being controlled? What if—?

"She can hear it," Dumbledore said, ignorant of Severus' building terror. "I imagine it scared the poor girl half to death the first time it spoke near her."

"Why didn't she come forward, then?"

"Why does any child hide information? Because she was uncertain and afraid. Her upbringing with Petunia and Vernon—." And here Severus saw a shadow of the man Voldemort still feared, no matter his diminished power and ability. For the Potions Master, thoughts of Tuney curdled hot and hateful, surging with the kind of terrible longing that swayed him toward the Dark Arts; a lust for violence, for retribution, for ten long years of his wrist burning in agony every time she and her dumb waste of a husband raised a hand to the girl. Dumbledore's anger was a different beast entirely; it was cool, quiet, and subtle. It existed in his eyes, in his voice—and it cut all the more deeply for its reservation. "—has taught Harriet caution when approaching adults with her concerns."

 _Stubborn, obstinate brat._

"It weighs heavy on my heart, Severus, the thought of him whispering madness in the child's ear. Should he learn of their shared ability, he'll seek to corrupt her. We can't let that happen. Harriet is _good_ , and in the end, that goodness will be what saves her and those she loves from Tom Riddle."

 _Love_. Severus almost rolled his eyes; Merlin spare him from Albus Dumbledore and his crackpot notions on _love_. Love did nothing but sow discontent in wayward, unsuspecting hearts. Severus had loved Lily—not as a sister, not romantically, but in the way one loves the constant and simple things in their life: a cool breeze on a summer day, a comfortable place to rest after a trying day, the shoulder upon which one cries and sheds their woes. Not that Severus ever cried, but Lily had always been the first one he'd see after rowing with his father. He could still remember the feel of her warm fingers sticking Muggle plasters over his cuts.

She was part of the building blocks he'd built his life upon. From the time that they were seven-years-old, it had been _Severus and Lily_ , two constants sharing a single sphere through their formative years—and then she was gone, gone like summer days and cool breezes and comfortable places, plunging Severus into an undying winter of his own fucking making. Oh, he'd placed the blame on everyone else when it happened—on _her_ , on Potter, Black, Pettigrew, Lupin, on that worthless dickhead Slughorn who couldn't spare a stringy half-blood an iota of attention, on Dumbledore and McGonagall and the blasted Dark Lord—when it always came down to two horrid syllables escaping his own bloody mouth.

In the end, love brought Severus nothing but servitude, and it was still the only part of him worth a shite.

The Headmaster poured himself a small hot toddy and offered one to Severus, but the Potions Master declined with a jerk of his head, not meeting his eyes.

"Are you sure, my boy? It is Christmas, after all."

"No. I imagine Slytherin is still awake and—slithering."

Dumbledore sipped his drink and pursed his lips, not quite holding back his smile. "Ah, perhaps there is something to the old adage of ' _no rest for the wicked.'_ "

"Are you referring to me or to him?"

"Never you, Severus."

The Potions Master snorted and flicked his hair back from his eyes. "Of course, Headmaster," he drawled. "If you're interested, I do have a _theory_ on what Potter and Black are up to."

"Oh dear."

"Indeed. I informed you of a theft from my private stores?"

"Yes, you did."

"I provided you a list of the possible potions one might intend to brew with those missing ingredients—among which was _Polyjuice Potion_." Severus' black eyes glinted in the firelight and he crossed his arms, gritting his teeth. "Earlier this afternoon, I noticed Sinistra acting oddly, and her shoes were quite similar to the pair for the girls' uniform, aside from their size. At dinner, she was dressed differently and didn't seem to have any memory of our meeting in the staff room. She mentioned having a, and I quote, ' _lovely afternoon with Miss Black discussing various ephemerides and their impact upon transmutation Transfigurations._ '"

Dumbledore covered his mouth with his hand, looking very close to laughter, which only served to further infuriate Severus. "Do you truly think our wayward trio capable of brewing Polyjuice Potion? They are only second-years, Severus."

"Black? Merlin, no. Potter and Granger?" Severus considered the idea again, just as he'd been doing all afternoon, ever since he glimpsed Sinistra's curious choice in footwear—ever since he first took note of the missing ingredients, really, and theorized Potter and her cohorts might have gotten into his stores somehow. He wasn't an idiot; the timing of their visit to his office and the theft were suspiciously close. If he had a _shred_ of proof, he'd ruin their wretched little lives, but for now, he'd settle for making them miserable. If he didn't strangle all three first. "Potter and Granger could do it, especially if Granger coached the girl."

"If you're right, Severus, what do you believe Miss Potter learned?"

"Too much. Slytherin was particularly loquacious today. If it was, in fact, her masquerading as Sinistra, she _does_ know it's a Basilisk now."

Dumbledore sighed. "Oh, Harriet," he murmured, shaking his head.

"You do realize I'm going to give her and Black detention for the remainder of break, correct?" _Possibly into next year, doing some of the foulest ingredient prep imaginable._

"I think, under the circumstances, I will allow it." The Headmaster rubbed his brow, then returned his attention to his drink. "I've asked Minerva to give Mr. Longbottom detention as well."

Severus almost laughed. "What? The precious Boy Who Lived in _detention_? How scandalous."

"Like dear Harriet, Neville has become indelibly curious about the Chamber, but he is not as…well, let's say _circumspect_ as Miss Potter and her friends."

"You mean he's a bloody, dunderhead Gryffindor who wouldn't know discretion if it kicked him in the face."

"That's not what I said, Severus."

"No, it's what you _meant._ " He leaned off the wall and slunk over to one of the chairs in front of Dumbledore's desk. He Summoned the rum and a cup, pouring himself a mouthful and forgoing the tea. They drank in silence, the fire crackling in the grate, the winter winds buffeting the tower walls, and Severus finished his rum far too soon for his liking. Bloody Potter was going to be the death of him. "So…you don't suspect the girl is the one behind the Chamber's opening?"

"No. Harriet is a reticent child, but she knows her own mind. I fear we may be playing host to a far more insidious host."

Severus sunk into his seat, leaning into his hand, pale fingers splayed across his face. He studied the Headmaster, the minutiae of the older wizard's expressions and subtle movements, the steady whir of silver instruments interrupting his own introspection. "You think it's another one of his homunculi."

"Possibly."

"For fuck's sake, Albus!" Severus' empty glass flew and crashed into the hearth. Fawkes shrieked on his perch. "We're barely treading water as is, torn between Gaunt and Slytherin! We're well and truly buggered if he has another one! _How_ is he making them if the Dark Lord isn't even alive?!"

"But he is alive, my boy. Simply not in a state conceivable to you or I. Did incident with Quirinus prove nothing to you? As for how he makes them, I cannot say."

"Not ' _cannot_.' You ' _will not'_ say! _"_

"Fine. I will not say, for I do not know for sure, Severus. I have only my suspicions."

 _And a distinct lack of trust_ , the Potions Master sneered in his own thoughts, steepling his hands together. Morgana save them if another clone of Tom bloody Riddle reared its foul head.

Discussion turned to pettier and more inconsequential topics, and eventually McGonagall joined them, the Scottish witch worked into high dudgeon over the Weasley twins' latest atrocity, to which Severus gave his usual suggestion of expulsion. Minerva rounded on him, hat askew, and scowled.

"And what of your own students, Snape? Are they behaving?"

Severus shared a blank look with the Headmaster. _If one can call potential larceny, lying, and identity theft behaving._

"As docile as lambs, Minerva. As docile as lambs."

 **xXx**

Severus' feet moved without a sound upon the cold stones as he wandered into the castle's depths.

Curfew had long since passed, giving way to snoring portraits and lazy, tired ghosts, winter thick and chilling as it seeped into the halls and fought against the wavering warmth thrown by the guttering torches. Severus himself was little more than a taut, narrow shadow drifting against the wall, walking carefully, a faint blush in his face from that third glass of rum he knew he shouldn't have had. _Bloody old goats._

He found no students out of bed, no familiars causing mischief, no Peeves, the light in Slytherin's office gone dark for the night, Filch passed out and snoring with Trelawney and a dozen bottles of sherry in the staff lounge on the sixth floor.

There was no snake, no Petrified children, no writing on the wall, which was all well and good, because some blighter kept killing all the fucking roosters, and Severus wasn't stupid enough to think he could surprise a Basilisk while half-pissed and survive.

He returned to his office like a knackered reptile creeping back to its den and collapsed in his chair, groaning at the frigid cold that had stolen into the room after the fire had died earlier in the evening. He couldn't be arsed with lighting it again, and so he only waved a hand at the candle on the desk, letting its paltry glow give the room color and shape.

Gifts cluttered part of the floor and the counter where he worked with smaller cauldrons or personal brews. It would shock most of the student population to know the dreaded Dungeon Bat _did_ , in fact, receive presents for Yule—but always the same gifts, from the same people, thoughtless trinkets and items bought in bulk when the pure-blood families did their yearly shopping for tokens meant to be sent to acquaintances for posterity's sake. The heap consisted of the same standard potions manuals nabbed off the bargain rack at Flourish and Blotts, packages of quills, parchment, and cheap ink. Lucius and Narcissa always sent him the same bottle of Blishen's every year, despite the fact that he'd—mostly—given up drinking.

 _Except for when obstinate old Gryffindors badger you into it, idiot._

He'd end up binning most of the items without bothering to shuck the paper. Severus sneered at the familiar shapes and packages—and then his eyes caught on something not so familiar.

The old families used the same, ubiquitous wrapping paper, another staple of their seemingly infinite ability to channel the same, stupid trains of thought, but this gift had been folded together in what looked like standard parchment paper, sealed with far too much Spell-O-Tape. Severus flicked his wrist and let his wand fall into his hand, waving it at the innocuous package so it floated over and dropped onto his desk without a sound.

After two detection spells failed to find anything amiss, Severus stuck his wand back into his sleeve and tore the parchment open.

Something dry and fragile brushed his fingertips as it fell to the desk's top and the Potions Master found himself staring at a loose pile of shed snakeskin. From under the skin, he slid free a brief note.

 _Professor Snape,_

 _Thanks for watching us this summer. Hermione told me Horned Serpent skin is rare, and I hope you find it useful._

 _\- Harriet Potter & Elara Black_

 _P.S., Elara said not to put her name on the card but I did anyway._

Severus sighed as he read the note again, folding the torn parchment in his fingers.

 _The brat really is going to be the death of me._

* * *

 **A/N: Snape chapters are always fun to write.**


	82. in the heart of the earth

**_lxxxii. in the heart of the earth_**

Harriet and Elara stood huddled in the shadow of Verna the Vexing, a rather foreboding statue guarding the corridor to the upper dungeons where the Hufflepuffs dwelt. They waited and watched students arrive in the entrance hall.

"Do you see him?" Elara whispered.

"No," Harriet replied, but she could see very little in the dim lighting, a blizzard rallying itself out beyond the bounds of the lake, making the grounds and the steps leading into the castle darker than usual. Everyone coming inside had their cloaks wrapped tight and their hoods drawn high.

Elara sighed. "We might as well get it over with. We can't hide forever."

Harriet thought she'd love to hide forever and disagreed with Elara, because if she had to spend another minute in the dungeons prepping potions ingredients or cleaning the cupboard or sitting very quietly staring at the wall, she might just pickle herself in a large jar to get away. "You know he's just waiting to swoop in like a—a vampire bat! Ready to suck the life and—and fun out of everything he can."

"You're being dramatic."

"'Course I'm being dramatic, but it doesn't make it any less true."

Elara pulled a face that Harriet chose to ignore, instead swiping her overlong fringe from her eyes as she peered into the higher hall. "I think…that's her."

"Do you see Snape?"

"Isn't that him there, with Professor McGonagall?"

The back of that black cloak _had_ to be Snape, because Professor Slytherin didn't loom quite so much, and the pair of brawling Gryffindors he and McGonagall had cornered looked suitably cowed.

"Wait here."

Elara stepped out from behind Verna the Vexing and darted forward, maneuvering through the cold, tired crowd with relative ease. Harriet saw Hermione jump when Elara's hand suddenly grabbed her by the wrist, but she relented to the other witch's insistent tugging, and they retreated from the entrance hall not a moment too soon. Snape turned from McGonagall and the Gryffindors, his dark eyes sweeping the area. He scowled.

"Harriet!" Hermione exclaimed, and they embraced, Harriet getting a face full of snow-dampened hair, Hermione wincing when she felt Livi's coils hidden under her cloak. "What happened? Did you two finish our, erm, project? Was it successful? What did you learn—?"

"Not here," Elara interjected, her gray eyes flicking from Snape to the other professors and ears who might be listening in. "Come on, let's go to Myrtle's."

"Myrtle's? But what about dinner—."

Harriet let Elara explain why they'd be better off going hungry for the night if it meant avoiding the staff, because not only Snape had been keen on assigning detentions to students over the break. Ron Weasley actually _swore_ at Professor Sprout when he got in trouble for throwing snowballs at her Giddy Gladiolas, and apparently got a letter sent home to his mum. Elara theorized the professors meant to keep them from wandering off and thus close at hand if anything went amiss, and Harriet was inclined to agree with her, especially after what she heard Slytherin say in the staffroom. Still, she wished the holidays hadn't been so dreadfully boring.

They found the loo as it always was; cold, wet, poorly lit and smelling damp and musty. Harriet thought they spent far too much time in there, but finding a private place for conversation at Hogwarts could prove challenging. Using Harriet's trunk had its limitations, what with Pansy always interfering and Elara's hatred for tight, confined spaces. Longbottom was mucking about, sticking his nose in everyone else's business, and that made things even more difficult. So, the trio tromped once more into Myrtle's loo, for what Harriet hoped was the last time.

"Elara doesn't even have detention anymore," Harriet commented to the ongoing conversation, pouting as they stood together in the stall where their potion had once bubbled. "It's not fair."

"Yes, but tell her _why_ that is."

Harriet leaned on the stall wall. "It's not _my_ fault. Snape had us squeezing ink from squids, and he started telling me off for doing it wrong, and err—."

Elara lifted a brow while Hermione looked between them, clearly confused over where this tangent was going.

"I squeezed the squid a bit too hard because the berk was frustrating me, and the eye popped, splattering on Elara and—well, you know how she gets. She sicked up all over Snape—."

"And then this little monster started cackling like it was the most brilliant thing she'd ever seen, which is why _you're_ still in detention with Snape while _I_ got reassigned to Professor McGonagall, whose an actual human being and only set me lines, not—squeezing squids."

"His face was pretty funny, though."

"I thought he was going to kill us both and hide the bodies in a cauldron."

Baffled, Hermione shook her head and blinked, loose coils of hair bouncing around her shoulders. "But what about the Polyjuice? What _happened?_ "

"It worked," Harriet rushed to assure her. _A little bit too well_. Turning back into herself had been both a relief and a right pain. "Everything went to plan and I wasn't caught, but—um—Snape knows."

"What? How could he possibly know if you weren't caught?"

"He knows," Elara asserted before Harriet could, her face grim. "He's far too observant, and he keeps attempting to confuse or catch us at a lie. He doesn't have proof, else we'd probably be expelled, but Snape never needs proof, does he?"

Harriet nodded, remembering when they'd escaped the troll and he'd snarled at them. _I don't need proof, Potter, and you're a fool to suggest otherwise._ She shivered. "That's why we grabbed you straight off. We worried he'd trick a confession out of you."

Rubbing the spot between her brows, Hermione kept her eyes on the sticky tiles as she thought. "But how could he know about the Polyjuice? Or, in this instance, _guess_ about the Polyjuice? Because that's just highly unlikely."

"I think it was my shoes," Harriet confessed, and all three witches looked down at the shoes in question—a pair of black, laced brogues with a solid, flat heel and a few scuffs on the side. "We didn't have a pair of Professor Sinistra's, and though the robes mostly covered them, he seemed to notice and look down as I was leaving. He probably would have followed me had he not been sitting with Slytherin."

A pained look crossed Hermione's face. "Of course. Those are clearly from the uniform." Girls had two choices for shoes: the brogues with laces Elara and Harriet wore, or the single-strap Mary Janes Hermione had on. "Was it worth it? Did you learn anything?"

Nodding, Harriet quickly recited all she'd heard, speaking in a low undertone so her words wouldn't bounce in the confined space. She couldn't remember every word verbatim the way Hermione might have desired, but she recalled enough of the details. The more she spoke, the more Hermione's expression twisted in shock, disgust—and finally, anger.

"But if Professor Slytherin's known where the Chamber is all this time, then he _knew_ there was a Basilisk in there before this other person came around and let it out! A _Basilisk!_ That's preposterous! It couldn't possibly be a Basilisk! Someone would be—." She winced, her voice high and strangled. Before she spoke again, Hermione took a breath and calmed herself. "We didn't see much information on Basilisks when we were researching, but what we _did_ read said absolutely nothing about _Petrification_. Basilisks are exceedingly dangerous and Dark; not to be cruel, but we have to wonder why no one has _died_. And why does he assume Minister Gaunt is behind this? None of this makes any sense at all."

Hermione pressed her hands against her cheeks and chewed on her lip, as she was fond of doing when presented with a particularly daunting problem. No matter her friend's tenacity, Harriet didn't think she'd make any sense of this puzzle; _somebody_ opened the bloody Chamber, not that it mattered, according to Slytherin. Apparently the founder's Basilisk was no longer in residence.

"It might be best to let this go and just keep our heads down," Elara muttered. Hermione shot her a look, and the taller witch returned it. "Harriet and I will make sure you're never alone, and we'll be careful not to wander."

"Like any of that matters when there's a _Basilisk_ roving about—one that can apparently flout all laws of physics and—and _magical_ physics and just vanish into thin air whenever it pleases!"

Her hands moved from her cheeks to cover the whole of her face, and Elara touched her shoulder, giving it an awkward rub.

Harriet tried to think of something clever or comforting to say, and as she turned over the words in her own head, she heard footsteps in the hall. Recalling how Longbottom had been seconds away from barging into the loo after she turned into Professor Sinistra, Harriet fumbled at her pockets and jerked out her Invisibility Cloak.

"Harriet?" Hermione questioned, looking up when she felt the Cloak's odd, heavy cloth fall over her head. "What are you doing?"

"Someone's coming—."

The door came open and struck the inner wall with considerable force. The three witches settling under the Invisibility Cloak flinched, drawing closer together, their breath held. At first, Harriet thought it might be Snape; the Potions Master had a terrible penchant for throwing doors open, dramatic as could be, but she couldn't imagine the wizard mad enough to go trouncing into a girls' loo. A shadow pulled along the floor, no footsteps seeming to touch the damp tiles—and the first stall door slammed open.

A knot of fear twisted in Harriet's middle as whoever had entered the loo continued to open each stall, pausing just long enough to ascertain it was empty before moving on to the next. When the door to their stall came open, Harriet felt the air ripple against the Cloak—and her throat tightened upon seeing Professor Slytherin standing there, his red eyes bright and ghastly in the lowlight, the hem of his robes gliding over the water like a snake's scaled belly.

 _What on earth is he doing here? Why is Professor Slytherin checking a lavatory when everyone else is at dinner? Is he—some kind of pervert?_

Two more stalls extended beyond the one currently occupied by the three witches, and Slytherin checked them both. Harriet didn't dare move, and so she lost sight of the wizard for a minute, marveling at how he managed to walk without a sound, like he didn't have feet. Slytherin came into view again as he went to the sinks, and he leaned against the middle one, pale hands braced on the porcelain. He looked at himself in the mirror, his young face blank, eerie in its passivity—and, all of a sudden, he stepped back.

" _Open_."

Livi stirred beneath Harriet's shirt at the utterance of Parseltongue, and a faint shiver went through the floor under their feet, rattling the fixtures and toilets fixed to the walls and floors. Professor Slytherin stepped back again, and the sinks _moved_ , the middle one rising upward, the others peeling to the side like a misshapen flower blooming, its petals unfurling to reveal its center—or, in this case, the opening of a huge pipe.

"What is he doing?" Hermione breathed in Harriet's ear, but the younger girl didn't have an answer for her. What _was_ the professor doing? Slytherin watched the sinks until they stopped, settling in place with a jarring click, and then the wizard strode forward without an ounce of hesitation, stepped into the pipe, and vanished into its unknown depths. Hermione and Elara mirrored Harriet's gasp.

Moving together, the trio moved to the pipe's edge and looked inside, but they could nothing aside from the gray metal, corroded by years and years of water passing against it. "He said 'open' in Parseltongue," Harriet told the other two, feeling on the edge of an epiphany she wasn't sure she wanted to make. "What if—? It has to be the _Chamber!_ "

They stared into the bottomless dark and shared a nervous, awkward breath. It was the Chamber of Secrets. They were looking down at the entrance to Salazar Slytherin's legendary Chamber—in a bloody girl's loo.

The sudden shivering started again, and the sinks began to pull in upon themselves, closing the entrance behind the professor. Elara and Hermione shuffled back, and Harriet tried to as well, but she couldn't move her feet. She swayed, caught unawares by the sudden loss of traction, and she had just enough time to see Set's black, shadowy hands wrap about her ankles before he yanked her forward, and Harriet plunged down into the closing pipe.

" _Harriet!_ "

Hermione's shocked shriek disappeared in an instant, whipped away by the harsh _clang!_ of Harriet smacking her head, her elbows and shins skidding on the bumpy rivets, rolling once, and then—

 _Crash!_

She landed hard upon a solid, flat surface, the air leaving her lungs in a jagged, broken gust. Harriet heard her name again—distant now, so far she couldn't rightly say if it was her name being called or just an echo of her own thoughts—and then the dreaded, decisive thump of the sinks coming back together, trapping Harriet below their depths.

" _Fuck!_ "

The dark pressed in on all sides and she panted, scared and more than a little rattled by the fall. As far as she could tell, she knelt on a stone landing at the bottom of the pipe, a deep gutter carved into the flagstones where water could flow and trickle into what sounded like a culvert. Harriet stuck her hand over the open space and felt the cold emptiness press against her skin. Squinting, she thought the culvert—the very one she'd almost rolled right into—turned away, and plunged downward again in another drain.

Harriet patted the surface under her until she could find the pipe that had dumped her here, and she also found the Invisibility Cloak tangled about her legs. Livius loosened his coils from around her body, cursing the sudden, quick descent.

" _Are you hurt?_ " she asked him, keeping her voice low. How Professor Slytherin hadn't come running, she hadn't a clue. Hadn't he heard her fall? If he hadn't, should she risk lighting her wand? Would it be better to be found, to go on undetected? If this truly was the entrance to the Chamber, Harriet didn't much like the idea of Slytherin knowing she'd stumbled inside.

After he finished cursing her name and her blatant disrespect, Livi calmed down enough to report no, he wasn't hurt, Harriet's arms having taken the brunt of the impact. " _Can you tell me the way out?_ "

" _We shall sssee._ "

She felt the serpent move about, hissing, and neither of them could get more than foot up the first pipe before sliding back down. Harriet tried telling it to open, or to make stairs or an exit, but the pipe and surrounding wall remained obstinately still. She was stuck.

" _There isss a tunnel over there._ "

" _A tunnel?_ "

Blind in the dark, Harriet followed Livi's voice and finally decided to risk lighting her wand. She pulled it from her brace, whispering, " _Lumos Minima_."

The paltry glow illuminated the narrow brick platform she stood upon and part of the deep culvert, a wide, corroded pipe diving down into the sodden blackness of the earth. To Harriet, it looked as if someone had built the platform after the fact, as if the pipes had been put into place and the builder had cut into them specifically to form a landing place for anyone looking to enter the aforementioned tunnel. A rough stone snake encircled the rounded entrance, and the tunnel beyond swept away, curling out of sight.

Set formed on the craggy wall and pointed down into the tunnel's depths.

"Like I'd follow you, you arsehole!" Harriet hissed. "It's your fault I'm bloody stuck here!"

Unmoved, Set pointed again, and Harriet once more felt the strange, sticky weight on her feet that had dragged her down here in the first place. " _Fine!_ "

She had little choice in the matter, since she couldn't figure out how to open the entrance behind her. Swallowing, Harriet pulled the Invisibility Cloak around her shoulders, told Livi to follow, and set off into the dark.

 **x X x**

The passage rounded in upon itself like the coils of a huge, dozing serpent, the uneven floor slanted low with the occasional step cut into the stone. Harriet kept one hand on the inner wall, and sometimes her fingers pressed against odd runes and symbols carved deep into the bedrock. She could see striations in the earth, different minerals and stones compressed by thousands of years of time and shifting earth, thin lines of gemstones glittering when her wand passed by them.

Ahead, Harriet could hear a muffled, constant roaring, like white noise on the telly when Dudley passed out and the program went off air. The air grew thin and smelled of wet things, reeds and brine and algae. Twice Harriet stopped and considered going back, going and waiting by the entrance, because Elara and Hermione would find someone to rescue her eventually. She only moved on with Set's encouragement, and because she kept imagining horrid scenarios in which no one ever came for her, and she died alone in the miserable dark.

 _That's a cheery thought_.

The roaring grew louder, as did the smell. The tunnel stopped curving inward—and Harriet stifled a curse when she stepped forward and found herself at the edge of a massive underground reservoir, a solid bridge of natural rock leaping over the black liquid, framed on either side by rushing waterfalls. Lights hung in the cavern overhead like bulbous green stars plucked from the sky, kept aloft by magic alone, shining on the water and the bridge—and the vault door on the other side of the cavern, the one Harriet could see Professor Slytherin disappearing through.

" _Nox_ ," she murmured, lowering her wand. " _C'mon, Livi._ "

Harriet urged the serpent up onto her shoulders and pulled the Cloak into place before hurrying over the bridge. The water masked her footsteps, and so she ran to catch the wizard, worried he'd shut the door and strand her outside of it. Slytherin moved at a steady clip, his wand in his hand, his robes whispering over the flat, shined stone of the new solar's interior. Harriet stepped over the door's raised threshold after him.

More little spots of starlight waited in the chamber, shining upon a vast, brass contraption of concentric circles forming a loose sphere, a solid bar in the middle of the floor holding it above them. The rustic, untouched texture of the walls gave way to Transfigured blocks and pillars—and Harriet gulped when she tipped her chin back and saw the undulating waters of the lake's belly rippling where there should have been a ceiling. _What's holding that up?! Magic?! What if it wears off?!_

She didn't have time to puzzle the mystery of it; Slytherin crossed the space without thought to the water overhead and stepped up to a second vault door, five metal snakes forming the head of a hydra splayed out from the center.

" _Open_ ," Professor Slytherin commanded, and the snakes obeyed, heads recoiling, the lock slamming back with a thunderous bang. The door rolled open, and Slytherin continued on his way with Harriet staying a few meters behind.

They entered another tunnel, long and dark, the professor not bothering to light his wand, and they stopped before yet another door. This opened just as the others had, revealing what Harriet could only think was the _true_ Chamber of Secrets beyond it.

A vast chasm of open space, illuminated by faint, shimmering green light, the Chamber was larger than any Muggle cathedral but just as grand and self-assuming; a palpable film of disuse maligned by the scent of rot coated the air, but it still felt _sacred_ there, a place for quiet awe and lowered voices. The columns rose up and up and _up_ , right into the black, nacreous haze clinging to the ribbed arches, long, reflective pools lining the wide central aisle. Dark stone doors and corridors connected to the main hall, but Harriet couldn't help but stare at the huge, bearded bust of Salazar Slytherin himself waiting at the Chamber's other end.

Professor Slytherin kept walking, tapping his wand against his open hand as if lost in thought. Harriet kept pace—until her foot connected with a puddle, creating a loud, sudden splash that had the wizard whirling around and pointing his wand directly at her head.

Harriet froze, holding her breath, and Slytherin continued to hold his wand high. For one horrid second, it looked as if he could see her, but then his eerie red eyes roved away, taking in the rest of the Chamber, flitting from shadow to shadow in search of the noise's cause. " _Homenum revelio_."

The spell expanded outward from his wand and crossed over Harriet, but it didn't settle. When nothing happened, Slytherin narrowed his eyes and finally— _finally_ —lowered his wand, his eyes still searching as he turned his back. Harriet sucked in a discreet breath.

 _That was close._

The wizard walked, silent as ever, until he stood under the unblinking eyes of his ancestor, every line of his face cast in deep relief by that watery, aquamarine glow, a single coil of brown hair falling across his brow. Slytherin lifted his free hand toward Salazar's face and snarled in Parseltongue. " _I command you Salazar Slytherin, greatest of the Founders four, to bequeath your secrets unto me!_ "

Stone grated on stone, and Harriet watched in horrified trepidation as Salazar's mouth opened like one of those chintzy nutcracker dolls Aunt Petunia always left on the mantel at Christmas, revealing a narrow, blackened tunnel smaller than those they'd traversed to reach the Chamber. She waited as the dust settled and the shallow pool at the bust's massive chin stopped rippling. She waited for a full minute, tense and afraid—and yet, nothing happened.

Slytherin scoffed, dropping his arm. "Miserable cretin." He started casting spells then, putting his back to the statue, muttering and reading some kind of magic relay Harriet couldn't decipher. _He's looking for the Basilisk again, isn't he?_ the young witch thought as she observed the swift, steady motions of the professor's hands, the magic prickling her skin, seeming to brush her cheeks like warm, curious fingertips. Harriet pulled away, spooked, and minded her feet as she put distance between herself and whatever spellcraft Slytherin was evoking.

 _Thank Merlin the Basilisk isn't here!_ The witch had a soft spot for creepy, odd things, especially snakes—but she drew the line at fifty-foot long eldritch monsters capable of killing with a single look.

A tell-tale tug at her ankle dropped Harriet's gaze, and Set pooled at the cloak's hem, allowing one finger to poke out in the direction of an adjoining corridor. Harriet gave Professor Slytherin one last glance, then went where Set indicated, shivering at the biting cold nipping at her face and exposed legs. The corridor immediately twisted off into the dark, and Harriet scooted along until confident she was at out of sight, at which point she risked lighting her wand again so she could see Set.

"This is bloody mad," she muttered, brushing a cobweb out of her hair. "But I've trusted you before. Don't let me down."

Livi twitched on her shoulder, angular head nudging the Cloak. " _The air isss…ssstrange here_."

" _How so?_ "

" _It is…enticccing._ "

Harriet understood what the snake meant, though she couldn't put the sensation into words. Truly, it made her a touch leery, because anything capable of overpowering the dismal, chilling design of this place to give her that fluttery feeling in her middle couldn't possibly be benign. It was like waking up on Christmas to find presents on the foot of her bed; it was a pleasant shock, settling into a warm, elated feeling bubbling in her veins. It made her want to stay and get lost in the veritable warren of passages and corridors and long, open cloisters looking down upon the reservoir's black waters. Harriet didn't trust the feeling at all.

At length, Set stopped before a wide, Gothic door, and the funny symbols chiseled into the petrified wood flickered like bleary, blinking eyes under his shadowy fingers. Then, the runes went dark. Wary, Harriet tapped the door handle with her wand and whispered, " _Aberto_." The handle twisted on its own and forced the door to ease open.

She didn't know what she expected. Another chamber perhaps, or another sprawling, mystical dungeon. Maybe more blasted tunnels seeming to lead ever downward into the heart of the earth—but when Harriet stepped over the threshold, she found herself in a plain, stuffy study. Dust and time had ravaged the grand, stately desk and the tall burrow of cabinets and shelves over the stone running the length of the room, but evidence of recent occupation persisted through the space. The brocaded chair behind the desk was new—or, at least, made within the last century. The wood stool by the counter was free of rot and damp, and the large, empty cauldron hanging by the rod above the barren hearth bore no spots of rust or charring.

"Is this Salazar Slytherin's office?" Harriet asked aloud, voicing the thought to herself. Given the grandiose, if deteriorated, spectacle of the main Chamber itself, she would've anticipated something gaudier and more luxurious from the Founder, but his office bore little of that pretension. The rug on the floor had long been reduced to a thin, matted layer of rat-chewed fibers. The portraits on the wall were all empty, their backgrounds faded and gray. A single mirror hung on the wall behind the desk, framed by a pair of lank, crooked curtains.

Set spilled from her shadow in a rolling, stark pillar of black against the pitted stones, and he stretched up the desk to encircle the newer items that lay upon its surface. There were quills and inkwells, sheaves of parchment left in tidy piles, and several books—the largest of which Set shoved toward Harriet, and she jumped to catch it as the volume slid toward the floor.

It was heavy, heavy enough that Harriet needed to stoop and cradle the book in both arms to lever it back up onto the desk. The cover had a lock on it—something she'd never seen before, not even in the library—but it didn't look very fancy. The ancient leather peeled and flaked in places, the parchment edges ragged, torn, and nibbled by moths. Seeing the lock and adjoining buckle were both undone, Harriet carefully pried the tome open and scrunched her nose at the funny letters written inside. It _looked_ like English, but the kind of English the very old portraits in the castle shouted at misbehaving students, which meant Harriet couldn't read a word of it.

An ink snake coiling about a block "S" was drawn on the first page, and the snake moved before Harriet's eyes. Above it, she could just barely decipher the faded rendering of a castle's silhouette done in charcoal.

 _This had to have belonged to the Founder!_

Harriet closed the book, and her eyes caught upon another item nudged into view by Set's persistent prodding. She picked up a journal—a _new_ journal, the binding still strong, if a bit creased—and thumbed through the pages, recognizing the familiar handwriting, though not the words themselves. Harriet held Professor Slytherin's notes, the lines written in some kind of code, all the letters jumbled or replaced by funny little runes and symbols. His careful script filled almost every page.

Harriet knew she should let it be; she should pretend she never saw the Chamber, let alone the notebook her cruel, sharp-eyed professor chose to hide within its depths. She needed to find the exit and she _needed_ to leave those book there—and yet, Set continued to lap at their edges like slow ocean waves, and Harriet's wand trembled ever so slightly in her uncertain hand. She licked her bottom lip—and in a fit of Gryffindor boldness, tossed Professor Slytherin's notebook atop the Founder's tome and pulled both into her arms.

"I'm going to regret this," Harriet griped, letting the book's weight settle against her ribs. Set fell about her invisible feet once more, circling like a pleased cat, and the witch only hoped she wasn't going to get herself caught. She was horrified to realize she really didn't know what Professor Slytherin would do if he discovered her down there. She wasn't sure he wouldn't kill her.

It was not a comforting realization.

"Now…how do I get out of here?"

* * *

 **A/N: I can't see Slytherin going down the slip'n'slide of doom into the sewer. I just can't.**

 **I base the entrance of the Chamber off the idea that it wasn't always located in a loo, and I just have a lot of thoughts on the place, because in canon, it's pretty boring for a _secret_ chamber, honestly xD. Basically, I had way too much fun with it and I hope you enjoy the new details and changes.**

 **So I pondered about this for a while: could _homenum revelio_ detect someone inside _The_ Invisibility Cloak? In canon it could, but for CDT, I'm saying it can't. It's a part of Death's cloak; magic cannot forcibly reveal it. Snape (and Mad Eye) can see through it, because the magic to do so is physically changing how they see and perceive things. The magic in their eyes is affecting _them_ , not the world around them. In CDT, the Cloak resists and shrugs off the magic of _Homenum Revelio._**


	83. rowena's silver

**_lxxxiii. rowena's silver_**

Elara Black was afraid of many things.

It crept up on her, that prickling, engulfing numbness inspired by nascent terrors and smaller, unfortunate triggers. She was afraid of enclosed spaces and high places, loud noises and germs to a certain extent. The dark made her wary, and sometimes she woke in the dead of night remembering the Slytherin dorms rested below thousands of tonnes of earth and water and couldn't get back to sleep. Strangers made her anxious—and so did familiar faces, because had it not been familiar faces who dragged her from her bed and ignored her screams as Father Phillips swung the branding iron closer?

Yes, Elara Black feared many things—but she swallowed the fear down, pushed it back, tempered anxiety with a hard, unyielding stare, and if her heart beat a tad faster than normal, that was no one's business but her own.

Even so, Elara couldn't stop the terrified cry from escaping when she watched Harriet fall into the gaping shadows opening beneath the loo's floor.

"Harriet!" Hermione's hand closed around Elara's wrist and tugged. "Let go!"

"Watch out!"

The other witch's grip increased— _too tight,_ _too tight!_ —and Elara panicked, throwing herself back and out of the way of the closing sinks, which had been Hermione's intention all along. The sinks sealed again with a wet snap.

"Don't grab me," Elara said much too sharply, too hoarsely, but Hermione only spared her a momentary glance before turning her attention to the sinks—and the hidden tunnel below them. The entrance had shut, leaving behind no indication of its existence. "This isn't good."

"This is a nightmare! How did she even fall?! She was fine—!" Hermione hurried forward, putting her head in the middle sink, which confused Elara until she started shouting. "Harriet? Harriet, can you hear me?"

Her voice echoed in the drain, and neither witch could say if it actually reached their friend under their feet. The sound bounced in their ears, and when it disappeared, the loo seemed quieter than ever. The silence sat so heavy, Elara had difficulty believing the crushing weight on her chest wasn't actually there.

Straightening, Hermione took a shaky breath, sinking her large front teeth into her lower lip. "Professor Slytherin's down there with her," she murmured, more to herself than to Elara. "She—if he's down there as well, Harriet should be fine. Professor Slytherin would—well, he wouldn't _hurt_ her. She's going to be fine."

"Or she's concussed," Elara retorted, hands shaking. "Or worse. I don't trust him in this slightest, and neither do you!"

"No! We—okay. We simply need to open the sinks, as Professor Slytherin did."

"If you haven't noticed, we're short a Parselmouth!"

"But we just need to mimic it!" Hermione scrunched her nose in concentration, and then hissed in her best approximation of Parseltongue. Despite her panic, Elara could admit something of the glottal sibilance Hermione made matched the snake tongue's hushed otherworldliness, but it wasn't quite right. The sinks remained in place.

"I think there's more of a rattle to it, and I don't know if I can copy it. Parseltongue is magic, after all. There haven't been many studies on it, given the rarity, but theoretically, humans should be physically incapable of the language, given we lack a glottis and a snake's hissing isn't made with their palate or compressions of air created by the tongue—."

Elara began pacing. Hermione rambled as she was prone to do in stressful situations.

"And snakes don't actually _speak_ to one another, do they? Animals don't have a true language. It's more of a primitive system of innate warnings and bodily communication—."

Elara kept pacing.

"Which would explain why magical creatures have higher intelligence, because the natural phenomenon of magic and successive breeding have changed their brains and morphology, and Parseltongue being a hereditary trait means magic has physically impacted a Parselmouth's brain—but that doesn't make sense, because anyone could consult a simple Punnett square and understand continuous breeding with non-Parselmouths would have long since wiped Parseltongue out—."

Elara stopped and stared at the line of sinks. Her hands still shook, perspiration beading her palms.

"But it's not as if Harriet hisses whenever she breathes, so I _should_ be able to mimic the sound she makes, unless it's impossible without an ingrained gene triggered by magic that really has nothing to do with the language whatsoever—.

"Move," Elara interrupted, whipping out her wand.

"What?"

"Get out of the way."

"Wait! What are you going to do—?"

Hermione finally shifted from the sink and Elara jerked her own arm, concentrating on the spell's formation. " _Bombarda!_ "

A sudden, loud _screech_ filled the lavatory—and the side of the stall behind them shattered like glass, wood splinters flying through the air as their ears rang. Both Elara and Hermione threw their arms over their heads, the latter yelping in surprise. Unlike the stall, the sink remained pristine and unmarked.

Elara almost swore. It appeared Slytherin—either the present professor or the Founder or one of his descendants—had Charmed the plumbing to be impervious.

"Ooh, what are you both up to?" A cool breeze preceded the sudden reemergence of Myrtle's spectral self, the teenage ghost floating through the wall at their backs, swooping low to survey the wreckage. She gasped. "Vandalism! In _my_ bathroom?! Don't you have anything better to do than come pick on me?!"

Her voice, usually sharp and nasally, rose several pitches until it neared unbearable levels, and Hermione winced. "We're terribly sorry, Myrtle," she pleaded. "There was a, err, accident."

"An _accident_?!" Myrtle wailed. "It wasn't an accident! You did it on purpose! You're going to be in so much trouble—!"

"What's down the drain over there?" Elara demanded as she jabbed a finger toward the stubborn sink and glared at the ghost. The undead residents of Hogwarts were fascinating conversationalists for the most part, but only in short bursts, and while Hermione always theorized on the reasons why the ghosts avoided Harriet, Elara secretly enjoyed her friend's odd spirit-repelling quirk. It saved them from having to endure Myrtle's tantrums, and it spared Elara having to see the Fat Friar.

Myrtle paused mid-shout, and her pockmarked face went slack with thought. "I don't know."

"Why not? You spend tons of time in the plumbing."

"I—." Her eyes scrunched behind her thick spectacles. "I haven't been down there, obviously."

"Why _not_? Why not go look?"

"Why don't _you_?!" Myrtle shot back. She rose higher in the air, looking equal parts frightened and confused, her head turning to the sinks and then away as if she couldn't help doing so. "Just because I'm _dead_ doesn't mean you get to order me about! I know you all make fun of me behind my back! 'Poor, ugly Myrtle. Poor, ugly—DEAD Myrtle!"

The ghost broke into hysterical—and, in Elara's opinion, forced—sobs before plunging headlong into the nearest toilet, her shrieks echoing in the pipes.

"There are a lot of places in the castle warded against ghosts," Hermione said in the aftermath. " _Hogwarts: A History_ has a compiled list of areas, and it would certainly make sense for the entrance to the Chamber to be blocked as well."

"Marvelous," Elara replied through gritted teeth. She tried another spell on the sinks, attempting to transfigure their shape instead of simply blasting them out of the way, but they still resisted her efforts. Water began to rise from the toilet Myrtle had disappeared down, and it spilled over the rim, flooding the floor.

"We need to leave before Filch comes!"

"We _need_ to help Harriet."

Huffing, Hermione took her by the hand instead of the wrist this time and tugged Elara toward the door. "We can't help if we're dragged off to his office. He'd take one look in here and have a fit!"

Elara knew she was right. They left the loo but didn't go far, only enough to create plausible deniability if Filch came stomping past.

"Honestly, I've only been back at school for an hour and Harriet's already found herself in trouble and you tried to blow something up—!"

Remembering the Basilisk, Elara reversed Hermione's hold upon her hand and set off at a quick dash, heart still racing in her chest, though her mind felt clearer than it had minutes prior. "We can't stand out here alone." Harriet had Professor Slytherin with her, and should the professor prove treacherous for whatever reason, then Harriet had Livius. Elara and Hermione had nothing but their wands, and if the Basilisk came upon them, they'd make for easy targets while the rest of the school sat comfortably in the Great Hall.

They returned to the school's foyer in record time, and together Elara and Hermione slipped through the main doors into the brightly lit hall, hurrying to their table under the cover of laughing voices and chattering flatware. "What are we going to do?" Hermione hissed beneath her breath, accidentally stepping on the hem of Elara's robes and nearly sending them both careening into the backs of a pair of Hufflepuffs. "Surely we can't just— _sit here_?"

"We'll wait until after dinner," Elara told her, not at all knowing if that was the right response or if she had the right idea. What was one meant to do when their best friend fell into a secret tunnel under a loo? If Harriet managed to avoid alerting Professor Slytherin to her presence and they caused a scene, they might only make things worse. But what if she was hurt? What if she wasn't? What if she was with Slytherin, and the professor cursed them into oblivion for exposing his ancestor's legacy? "And then—we'll go to Dumbledore."

They'd spent enough time in Myrtle's loo discussing all Harriet had overheard in the staffroom for dinner to be nearly over. Elara and Hermione hunched low in their seats and didn't bother touching any of the desserts arrayed before them, choosing instead to wait and gnaw over their own worry. Professor Slytherin was, naturally, absent from the High Table, and Elara let out a grateful breath when she spied Snape deep in conversation with a professor she didn't remember the name of. She twisted her hands together in her lap, and the empty plate before her jumped and shuddered on the table.

When Professor Dumbledore stood and dismissed them all, Hermione popped to her feet before Elara could, and they darted toward the front of the Great Hall, dodging around speculative classmates wondering where they were going. The Headmaster seemed to see them coming, for he paused in turning away with Professor McGonagall, the latter of which took one look at the pair and formed a tight line with her lips.

"Professor Dumbledore?" Hermione asked, her voice warbling with uncertainty, though Elara could see how hard she tried to keep it level. "May we speak with you a moment?"

His blue eyes skipped from Hermione to Elara, and when they failed to land upon a green-eyed, disheveled girl in the midst, something in the wizard's attention sharpened. "Of course. Let's step through here, shall we? We'll finish our conversation another time, Minerva."

He gestured for them to go before him, and together the trio walked through the side entrance typically utilized by staff, pausing inside the little antechamber squeezed between the Great Hall and the outer corridor. "Now," Professor Dumbledore said, resting his arm against his middle. "Judging by your expressions, am I to guess Harriet has gotten herself into a spot of trouble?"

Hermione and Elara nodded, the former blurting out, "We were in the second-floor lavatory when Professor Slytherin came in—and he didn't see us there, and he—well, he hissed in Parseltongue, and the sinks started to move and revealed a large pipe underneath and he jumped in and—."

"Harriet fell," Elara interjected, though a voice in the back of her mind commented it hadn't looked as if Harriet fell; it looked as if she'd been shoved, no matter how impossible that was. "And the entrance closed again before we could get her out."

"Is Harriet hurt?"

"We don't know, Professor."

The Headmaster led the way into the corridor, the two shorter witches rushing to match his swift, quiet stride. He avoided the main stairs and the crowd of sleepy, yet indelibly curious students that would be there, taking Elara and Hermione through a narrow, dark passage Elara hadn't known was there in the first place. Cobwebs swaddled the ceiling, illuminated by the bright spell-light spilling from Professor Dumbledore's wand, strung along like great globs of candy floss. Without warning, the passage merged again with the main corridor, leaving nothing behind them but a blank stretch of stone, and if Elara hadn't walked down the skinny passage, she would have never guessed it to be there.

"Stay close, if you please," Professor Dumbledore said, which caused both witches to stick to his heels like gormless chicks chasing a mother hen. They turned a corner, torches coming alive, starlight peeking through the shuttered windows holding bastion along the outer wall—and Elara crumpled under the weight of Harriet Potter as the girl came toppling out of a framed mirror.

"Harriet!"

The bespectacled witch rolled herself off of Elara and sat in a wet, messy heap on the stone floor, the smell of brine and old, damp rot radiating off her in waves. The Invisibility Cloak hung on her arm like a twisted wrapper. Aside from a few scrapes and a rather painful-looking raw spot on her shin from sliding down the pipe, she appeared unharmed—if a bit dazed. Livius wrapped himself about her shoulders, shaking his angular head as he eyed the newcomers with what Elara assumed was reptilian wariness.

"Oh," Harriet said when she spotted the Headmaster arrayed in a pair of burnt sienna robes peering down at her. "Hullo, Professor."

"Hello, Harriet," Dumbledore replied. "It appears we were a bit premature in mounting your rescue."

Harriet looked to her two friends as relief swept through her expression. "Thanks, Hermione and Elara."

They muttered their own relief at having her back, and Elara's heart finally slowed from its frantic, painful beat and seemed to crawl from her throat back into her chest where it belonged. Professor Dumbledore turned his attention to the mirror, a large, gilded piece with various spots of damage on the frame or the glass itself. "How extraordinary," the Headmaster remarked as he swept his wand against the mirror's surface, searching for something the three witches couldn't see.

"I don't know what happened," Harriet said as Hermione helped both her and Elara back to their feet. "I was in the—Chamber, did Hermione and Elara tell you about that yet? Blimey, Professor, there has to be about a hundred tunnels down there!"

"And what has happened to Professor Slytherin?"

"I think he's still inside? He was looking for the—erm, snake, and was brassed off when he couldn't find it." Harriet blinked, her green eyes flitting to the mirror. "There was a mirror like this one in what I think was an office, and I told it to open in Parseltongue. Next thing I knew, I ended up here."

"That is what so extraordinary," Professor Dumbledore replied with cheer. "Because this is a perfectly ordinary mirror."

The three Slytherins blinked. "What do you mean, sir?" Hermione inquired, brow furrowed. "There must be a Translocation Charm of some sort upon it, shouldn't there?"

"No. I can detect no magic of any kind upon it." He gave the surface two solid taps with his wand, and when nothing occurred, Elara silently agreed it appeared mundane. "This, my dears, is a Moon Mirror. It is very old, and there are more than a dozen of them scattered throughout the castle. Neither I nor any of my predecessors have ever discovered their true purpose."

"Why're they called ' _Moon Mirrors_ '?"

"These aren't made of glass, you see. Instead, their creator used the eggshells of an Occamy—a rare magical creature out of the east, whose eggs are comprised of solid silver. Early alchemists referred to silver as the ' _metal of the moon_ ,' and so the term extends to these lovely mirrors." Professor Dumbledore returned his wand to his pocket and tugged on the end of his beard, lost in thought. "It is said Rowena Ravenclaw herself fixed them to the castle's walls. Fascinating. If I were to guess, I would say the mirrors have pairs, with one being an exit and the other entrance. After you passed through the first mirror, Harriet, it seems the second sealed itself shut behind you. An effective way for Salazar Slytherin to journey about Hogwarts without exposing his secrets."

Elara looked into the polished silver surface and stared at her own disgruntled reflection. It didn't sit easy with her, the idea that any mirror in the school might actually be one of these Moon Mirrors and thus serve as an exit or entrance for people like Professor Slytherin to come slithering through. Magic was as vast as it was frightening, and though one could map out the school's halls and corridors and classrooms, Hogwarts continued to prove itself truly unknowable, a place of infinite mystery and discovery.

In the distance, the clock tower began to chime the hour, and Professor Dumbledore stirred. "Ah, well. If you're unharmed, Harriet, you three should return to the dorms."

"Yes, Professor."

The trio of witches walked away from the Headmaster then, Hermione fussing over Harriet's scrapes, Elara's hand fisted in a part of the Invisibility Cloak, letting the feel of the cold, slick fabric ground her. None of the three looked back at their professor, too preoccupied with thoughts of their beds and the perceived safety of their underground dormitory, and so neither Harriet, Elara, or Hermione saw the shadowy hand dip into the large pocket of Harriet's robes and drop a thin, weathered volume on the floor.

Professor Dumbledore spotted the journal and picked it up. His wizened fingers leafed through the coded pages, spied the familiar, unwelcome copperplate—and his blue eyes rose to watch the three witches until they disappeared from sight. He closed the journal with a snap.

"Extraordinary indeed."


	84. lost to the ages

**_lxxxiv. lost to the ages_**

By the end of the week, Harriet was certain Madam Pince would murder all three of them before term let out.

After Hermione stopped fussing and regained her breath, Harriet brought out the tome she stole from Slytherin's office and the bushy-haired witch went right back to fussing, going into absolute raptures about the treasure Harriet managed to nick from the bowels of the earth. Hermione informed her it was written in old Anglo-Saxon, and if they wanted a chance of reading what Salazar Slytherin himself had written on those crinkled pages, they'd have to translate it themselves.

Hence why Madam Pince was one step away from committing a triple homicide.

They arrived early every morning that week and waited for the elderly librarian to open the doors, taking over their favorite table in the back during lunch and break and before dinner, badgering Pince with questions about the materials they wanted and the sources they needed. Hermione had a terrible habit of gasping aloud when she made a discovery and hoarding far too many books, which irked Madam Pince, and Elara accidentally set off a Caterwauling Charm when she wandered too close to the Restricted Section. Twice. Harriet thought herself perfectly well-behaved—but then she got ink-covered fingerprints on a monogram more than seven-hundred years old about the Norman conquest and Madam Pince threatened to boil her alive. Twice.

In Harriet's latest letter to Mr. Flamel, Harriet told him about finding a book written by the Founder and wanting to translate it, leaving out her dubious acquisition of the book in question, and the wizard wrote back that " _you always have the most interesting questions and stories to tell, Harriet,_ " enclosing a primer he hoped would assist them in their quest. Hermione devoured the primer, of course, with help from Elara, who actually understood bits and pieces of Anglo-Saxon and could read the dated, cramped lettering better than anyone else. Harriet was relegated to scribing the chunks they managed to translate.

Harriet didn't mention the other book, the journal she _knew_ she took from the desk with Salazar Slytherin's tome. She panicked when she first discovered its absence, but Harriet found nothing when she searched, so it either fell out of her pocket somehow or never left the Chamber in the first place. After a minute of thought, she decided that might be for the best. Harriet was only a second-year, after all, and she didn't know all that much about magic; what if Professor Slytherin had a Tracking Charm on his journal? What if it was cursed? No, best the bloody thing not be in her possession when all was said and done.

"It's not anything Salazar Slytherin would have thought important," Hermione deduced on Friday, the three of them once more in the library hiding from Pince, who was determined to oust them early, being that it was the end of the week. They sat on the floor in the stacks devoted to Edwardian Wizarding history with a candle and Slytherin's obnoxiously heavy book open between them. "Parchment back then would have been more difficult to procure as well as more expensive, so even what we would consider scribbles or scratch paper were kept and bound together. The Founder kept notes here. It's not a diary, not really, but he did write down his thoughts on current events. He even mentions part of the east wing's construction—oh, this is _priceless_ , Harriet. To have a firsthand account of the castle's creation—."

"Does he waffle on for a full chapter about the plumbing? Because _Hogwarts: A History_ already did that."

Elara snorted.

Indignant, Hermione gave them both a stern look worthy of Professor McGonagall. "No, he doesn't mention the plumbing, because there was no plumbing in those days. It was added on later—and from your description, Harriet, it seems as if someone purposefully disguised the Chamber's entrance when the updates were started or converted old drains and drainage lines. He talks about the Chamber here in this bit, briefly." She scrunched her nose and consulted the primer again, holding it closer to the candle. " _Oh_."

"Oh?"

"I'm not entirely sure, but the context of the word would be odd otherwise…. You see this line here? Where he mentions the ' _neoðan_ '? That roughly translates to ' _the underneath_ ,' and if I'm not mistaken, that's what the Founder called the Chamber. In hindsight, it makes perfect sense. Why would Slytherin himself call it the _Chamber of Secrets_? That's too pedantic even for a bigoted egoist."

A sudden clopping of shoes on the floor turned their heads as Madam Pince bore down upon the trio. "You three again! Out! Out of the library! It's closing for the evening!"

"But it's not even time for it to close!"

" _Out_ , I said! Go to dinner! Go!"

Sulking, Harriet and the others allowed themselves to be ushered back into the corridor, and—leery of being isolated in an area of the castle where the Basilisk had already attacked—they rushed to the Great Hall, taking their usual spots at the House table before many of their classmates arrived. For a little while, Harriet pushed thoughts of Slytherin's book from her head and tucked into her supper, talking with the Beater Peregrine Derrick about the upcoming Quidditch match between Gryffindor and Hufflepuff and who he thought would win. Soon, however, dinner ended and the Slytherins returned to their dormitory, and Hermione asked if they could use Harriet's trunk to keep researching. Elara grimaced, but the trio descended into the extra room inside the trunk, lit the lantern, and shut the lid.

Livi peered from his terrarium, displeased with the interruption to his nap, and two smaller heads peeked over the teacup's rim.

"Harriet, is that _another_ snake?"

"Yeah!" she chirped, bending at the waist to pick up Kevin and her newest acquisition. "He's another Chr—Yule cracker golem. I got him at the feast." She held the skinny red snake out toward Hermione, since Elara had already seen the tiny creature when they'd pulled the cracker and Harriet tucked him into her sleeve. "His name is Rick."

"…Rick?"

"It's short for Godric—because he's red, like a Gryffindor."

"Then what's Kevin short for?"

"Kevin's short for Kevin. Are you daft?"

Hermione opened her mouth as if to argue, then thought better of it and shook her head. She removed Slytherin's book from her satchel and set it on the worktop, the spine creaking as she opened it to her marked place. "Never mind. Let's go back to the part we were reading before Madam Pince interrupted…."

And so they did, Harriet returning Kevin and Rick before retrieving her quill and parchment as Hermione and Elara scratched their heads and picked apart Slytherin's ancient lettering. Tired from dinner, Harriet's eyes glazed over, and her attention drifted, tracing the old spots on the wall where posters or placards used to hang, the faded Potter crest emblazoned on the cupboard. Sometimes she wondered if her dad had used this space, and Harriet amused herself with imagining what he could have possibly stored down here. What had he been like? She knew James Potter had been a Chaser and Head Boy, so did that mean he was brainy? Popular? Was Harriet anything like him?

"He mentions Rowena Ravenclaw quite often," Hermione muttered, squinting in the low light, bringing her face closer to the pages. "This section is almost incomprehensible. His handwriting is atrocious in places. Here he mentions something about a ' _nest_ ,' but is that the right word for it?" She flipped through Mr. Flamel's primer, growing more frustrated. "I can't decipher this nonsense!"

"It would make sense for Slytherin to talk about Ravenclaw, wouldn't it?" Harriet asked, worried she might get snapped at if she interrupted Hermione now. "All the stories say the Founders were friends before they made Hogwarts, so that means Slytherin and Ravenclaw were friends, too. Why else would he have those mirrors down in the Chamber—or the Underneath, or whatever?"

"That doesn't explain why the mirror only responded to Parseltongue," Elara pointed out. "Ravenclaw wasn't a Parselmouth."

The unspoken question in her tone went unanswered. True, the Moon Mirror in Salazar's study had only opened after Harriet had spoken to it in Parseltongue—and after Set had badgered and shadow-mimed her into inspecting the ruddy thing in the first place—but that didn't mean it was the _only_ way to get it to cooperate. If Ravenclaw made the mirror, then she knew it better than anyone else, and it was entirely possible for the Parseltongue password to be something like a failsafe just in case Rowena herself couldn't get through or open the way. It reminded Harriet of how she'd adjusted the Charm on the trunk just enough to let Elara and Hermione open the extra room. Maybe that was the whole reason Slytherin had the Moon Mirror in the first place.

Lost in thought, Harriet made idle scratch marks on the edge of the parchment with her eagle feather quill, and when Elara and Hermione started to bicker over the exact connotation of this "nest," Harriet took the opportunity to look over the book herself. Unlike Hermione, who dissected the thing page by page, Harriet marked her place and chose a random spot to flip to. Twice more she did this, until she spied a promising section complete with stray doodles and crossed out scribbles. Something about the image of the great Salazar Slytherin huffing and scrawling over his notebook like a teenager made Harriet want to laugh.

She made a right hash of the writing in trying to puzzle out a few of the disjointed sentences. ' _Fire, foe, cannot burn mine person, water cannot take mine lungs. What be I_?' Harriet nibbled on the end of the quill, picking through the stray lines here and there, finding other, similarly written phrases. A few struck her as being familiar. _Are these…riddles? Odd._

On the corner of the page, smudged by the fingers of someone long dead, Slytherin had drawn something feathery encircled by coils or thorns, Harriet couldn't tell which.

Above them, Harriet could hear the tired, impatient thump of feet moving into the dorm and the lavatory beyond, someone—probably Pansy—dropping their satchel with a particularly heavy bang. "C'mon, we have to be in bed before Prefect Farley comes by for her rounds."

Elara and Hermione abandoned their squabble with some reluctance and followed Harriet up the steps and out of the trunk. Never one to miss an opportunity for being an irritating berk, Pansy sat up from where she'd flounced on her own bed and glared at the trio. "What are you up to down there, Potter?" she demanded.

Harriet considered giving a snippy reply, but she was tired and not inclined to humor Parkinson. "Studying," she said as she closed the trunk. "Pince kicked us out of the library."

"Why not study in the common room like a _normal_ witch?"

Rolling her eyes, Harriet switched the latch on the trunk and opened it again, fishing out her nightgown from the small compartment. Elara disappeared into the washroom, and Hermione sat on the edge of her bed, brown eyes distant as she stared at the rug under her feet. Runcorn asked her about the quiz they were supposed to have in Astronomy later that night, but Hermione didn't hear her, so Katherine scoffed and went to ask Daphne instead. Harriet changed, then went to brush her teeth, and when she came back, Hermione was still sitting on the bed, her brow furrowed, lips pursed.

"…Hermione?"

"Hmm?"

"Everything all right?"

"Oh. Yes, I'm fine." She stood and smoothed the front of her skirt, though her face didn't lose that speculative look that made Harriet a mite nervous. Nevertheless, Harriet went to her own bed, drew the curtains, and tucked herself in. She set her glasses on the end table—and made sure to set a timer with her wand, having forgotten to do that more times than she cared to remember. The sound of her dormmates moving about settled, and soon Prefect Farley checked they were all in bed. Really she only popped her head in, pausing her conversation with her own dormmate long enough to see all the curtains were closed. Farley shut the door again, and Pansy continued whispering with Millicent once the prefect moved on. Harriet listened to the indistinct rasp of their voices and, slowly, fell asleep.

 **xXx**

Hours later, in the cold, unrelieved dark of the quiet dormitory, Harriet woke wide-eyed and gasping from a dreadful, slippery nightmare, the details quick to disperse and drain over the edges of her mind like spilled milk dripping off a counter's edge. It left her feeling unsettled and nervous, and so she sat up, shivering against the chill, and brought the blanket up over her head.

"It's just a dream," she reminded herself in a low whisper, her breath warming the air trapped under the cover. "It's not real."

The familiar mantra helped calm her nerves, and Harriet pushed the blanket off, peering into the dark with her myopic vision. The timer on her wand had yet to go off, and the other witches were still fast asleep, so Harriet assumed she hadn't dozed off for very long. With a grunt, she placed her glasses on her nose and nudged open the curtains, deciding it best to get up and read or study instead of trying to go back to sleep. All the other curtains remained closed—except for the ones around Hermione's bed, which was perfectly made without a single wrinkle in the counterpane.

"Hermione?" she whispered, picking up her wand. When no answer came, Harriet padded into the lavatory, finding it empty but for the steady _drip-drip_ of a loose faucet, so she returned to the main room. She happened to glance at her trunk and saw the latch undone.

 _What is she up to?_

Frowning, Harriet eased the lid open—and squinted against the sudden, soft glow of lantern light emanating from below. She threw a leg over the trunk's side and crept down the steps. "What are you doing?"

Hermione sat on the floor in the tiny room, Slytherin's book propped open upon her lap, Mr. Flamel's primer tucked under her knee. Livi had abandoned his terrarium, and Harriet knew Hermione was distracted because the older witch didn't so much as blink when the Horner Serpent hung his head off the shelf to inspect her bushy hair. Letting out a little huff, Harriet came to Hermione's side and tapped her on the shoulder. Hermione glanced up, her eyes filled with dreadful confusion, and again Harriet asked what she was doing down there.

"I couldn't sleep," she admitted. "I—. Slytherin made a comment I couldn't get out of my head, even when I lied down and tried to shut my eyes. He goes on these long tangents about the ' _gyr-blódgeótend_ ,' you see—these parts where it looks as if he'd tried to stab the parchment with his quill. According to him, they were quite a problem in his youth, and he—and Godric and Helga—lost several members of their families to their ' _deceit of the cræft_.' He _hated_ the _gyr-blódgeótend._ Despised them utterly and thought they should be wiped out. Do you know what it means? It translates to ' _dirty bloodshedder_ ,' and it's the etymological origin of _Mudblood_."

Harriet leaned on the wall and slid down until she could sit next to Hermione, wondering where this conversation was going. "Well, everyone knows he hated Muggle-borns. That's the whole bloody legend behind the Chamber, isn't it?"

"But that's just it! In the comment I translated just before we went up for bed, Slytherin mentioned those ' _from Eargian'_ —' _Eargian'_ being an early term for Muggles. He wrote about the tutelage of his Muggle-born students—and he didn't hate them, Harriet, he _didn't_. He hated the _gyr-blódgeótend,_ the dirty bloodshedders—those witches and wizards, pure-blood or not, who betrayed their own kind to the Muggles that hated and feared magical beings. This was far before the Statute of Secrecy; the Wizarding world was common knowledge to everybody. To Slytherin, you were either with magic, or against it, and though he remained suspicious of Muggle-borns, he didn't think them undeserving of their abilities. _Mudblood_ doesn't mean _Muggle-born_. It means _traitor_."

They stayed silent as Hermione's words sunk in, her hands tight upon the book's weathered edges, and Harriet watched as the color leached from her small knuckles.

"I had to keep reading. I had to be sure of what I'd spotted—because this means everything we know about the Chamber and its legend is—is utter _bollocks_ , Harriet! Rubbish! He didn't leave the Basilisk behind to kill the Muggle-born population; he left it behind as a final line of defense in a Muggle incursion! So much history, all lost to shoddy translation and misinterpretation!"

She slammed the book shut, and Harriet saved it before it could suffer more mistreatment in the hands of the bushy-haired witch. Harriet had never seen Hermione so frustrated and upset before. "I don't understand," she said, hesitant.

"Neither do I," Hermione retorted with a sniffle. "Professor Slytherin knows about this book. He's _read_ it! You know he has! And so he _must_ know the truth, for years even! But he's never said a thing! And people like him, and Professor Selwyn, and—and _Voldemort_ , keep using Salazar Slytherin's ideology as an excuse to harm and belittle Muggle-borns when that was never the Founder's intention. I never understood why I came to Slytherin House. I argued with the Hat, but it insisted, and for almost _two years_ I've questioned its decision every single day, every single time I had to put on the crest of an old, crusty _bigot_." Hermione wrapped her arms around her legs and balanced her chin on her knee, scowling. "But he wasn't a bigot. Merlin knows the man couldn't have been perfect—honestly, who leaves a _Basilisk_ in a school and thinks that's a good idea? But he wouldn't have spat on me because of my bloodline. He wouldn't have denied me my place here. People like the Dark Lord appropriate everything the Founder stood for and just—twist it until we can't recognize any of it anymore. Pride becomes fanaticism, ambition turns to greed, cunning an excuse for cold-blooded ruthlessness. This is what people think when they see us—just look at how the others behave around Slytherins after this Chamber nonsense! Like we're a pack of _murderers_ just waiting to happen. It's not _right._ "

Harriet struggled to think of something to say, but there was nothing at all that would make any of this any better.

Hermione shook her head. "No one will ever believe us. We could shout it from the top of the Astronomy Tower, and no one would ever listen. It changes everything, and yet it changes _nothing_ , and that frustrates me so much."

She unfolded one arm, and Harriet took her hand in her own, giving it a squeeze. She had a point; they couldn't reveal their possession of Salazar Slytherin's notes, not without dire consequences, and if they told a bunch of stuffy pure-bloods their idol wasn't the gleaming pillar of staunch magical lineage, they'd be called liars. Snape always harped on Harriet about _perception_ , and was this not yet another example of perception being tweaked to suit a particular frame of mind? Like when Dudley told stories about Harriet and all the neighbors thought her a nasty little hooligan without ever meeting her. Reality wouldn't change their views.

"Some people don't want to hear the truth, Hermione. Especially if it proves them wrong."

"I know."

"Slytherin's been dead for hundreds of years, so it doesn't matter what he thought anymore. Even if he _was_ a bigot, it's not _his_ House anymore; it's _ours._ You're just as much of a Slytherin as Malfoy or Parkinson or any of those gits, and we're not going to sit about and let those dodgy pure-bloods and near-sighted numpties give us a bad name, are we?"

Tension eased in Hermione's expression, and she smiled, the fevered brightness dimming in her eyes. "Yes, you're right." Her fingers tightened once more before she let go and began to search her pockets for a handkerchief. "Thank you, Harriet."

"You're welcome."

She found her sought handkerchief and though she managed to dry her tears, Hermione's face stayed blotchy and rather miserable looking. "There's more to that book than I think any of us expected," she said, changing the subject with a brisk sigh. "Such as his apparent connection with Rowena Ravenclaw. I can't put my finger on it, but something about that connection begs a more thorough inspection. I think it's important."

"As long as it doesn't end with me brewing an illegal potion and wearing Professor Sinistra's face," Harriet joked, and the mood lightened at last.

"No, I don't believe it will come to that."

"Oh, bloody hell."

"What is it?"

"I thought I'd suppressed all that. Now I remember and we've got Astronomy soon. How am I supposed to look her in the eye?" Harriet groaned.

Hermione laughed as she tucked away her handkerchief, and together they set Slytherin's book and Mr. Flame's primer on the shelf. "Just look at the top rim of your glasses."

"Because being cross-eyed is so much better. Ugh. Drinking that had to be the worse idea you've ever had, Hermione."

"Perhaps." She smiled again, the motion sharper now, almost mischievous. They ascended the steps into their silent dormitory, and as Hermione walked away, she whispered. "But also very informative."

* * *

 **A/N: I dabble a bit in trying to flesh-out the Founders' characters. It's always bothered me that Salazar (like most Slytherins) is just a two-dimensional villain in canon. The world during Hogwarts' founding was a much, much different place, and it seems ridiculous to me that in a time of war, invasions, plagues, and population discrepancies, that Salazar would honestly give a shite about where magic users came from, so long as they were loyal. I'm inclined to believe he would have hated pure-bloods like the Malfoys more, who came over with William the Conquerer, and xenophobia was huggge. But, y'know, head-canon. /shrug.**

 **Hermione: "Is that another snake?"**

 **Harriet: "Yeah, isn't he cute?"**

 **Hermione: *mentally organizing an intervention* "…Mhm."**


End file.
